Tag: iuu

NOAA Fisheries Plans to Enhance Seafood Import Monitoring
20Nov By Fishermen's NewsNo Comments
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NOAA Fisheries Plans to Enhance Seafood Import Monitoring

NOAA Fisheries on Nov. 14 introduced a new plan to combat illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing while at the same time strengthening the sustainability of seafood, and globally addressing forced labor issues. The announcement came in the wake of a comprehensive review of the Seafood Import Monitoring Program (SIMP) completed in November 2023, involving over 7,000 stakeholders, including seafood industry professionals, foreign governments, researchers and civil society groups. “Our goals are to strengthen the U.S. domestic seafood industry by promoting fair trade practices in the global seafood supply chain while building capacity to maintain and grow the program,” NOAA Administrator and Undersecretary of Commerce for Oceans and Atmosphere Richard Spinard said. “Once im...
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U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Oliver Berry Returns Following 46-Day Anti-IUU Patrol
23Oct By Mark Edward NeroNo Comments
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U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Oliver Berry Returns Following 46-Day Anti-IUU Patrol

The crew of Coast Guard cutter Oliver Berry returned to its homeport of Honolulu in late September after completing a 46-day patrol in Oceania. The crew's efforts included enhancing maritime domain awareness, combatting illegal fishing activities across Oceania and strengthening relationships with regional partners. During the patrol, the cutter’s crew enacted two bilateral maritime law enforcement agreements with Fiji and Samoa. The cutter departed Coast Guard Base Honolulu in August and traveled more than 7,600 nautical miles from the Hawaiian Islands to the west coast of Fiji. The patrol was in support of Operation Blue Pacific, a Coast Guard District 14 mission promoting security, safety, sovereignty and economic prosperity in Oceania. While in Fiji, the crew exercised the...
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Blocking Seafood Imports Produced By Forced Labor Gets Prioritized
17Jul By Fishermen's NewsNo Comments
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Blocking Seafood Imports Produced By Forced Labor Gets Prioritized

Homeland Security officials have declared efforts to block seafood produced by forced labor overseas from entering the United States a top priority, in part by requiring better documentation from seafood supply chains. The July 9 announcement from the Department of Homeland Security added seafood to its list of high-priority sectors in the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA). That legislation directs the agency's Forced Labor Enforcement Task Force to block import into the United States from Chinese forced labor in the Republic of China, especially from the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, or Xinjiang. The statement came amid extensive reports of illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing and forced labor by Chinese-flagged vessels and in Chinese-based seafood pro...
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NOAA Fisheries: More Than Half of Seafood Import Entry Filings Noncompliant
5Jun By Fishermen's NewsNo Comments
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NOAA Fisheries: More Than Half of Seafood Import Entry Filings Noncompliant

A new NOAA Fisheries report to Congress on combatting illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing finds that about 56% of audited import entry filings are noncompliant, mostly for incomplete chain of custody and misreporting of harvest weight. The volume and value of seafood species subject to the Seafood Import Monitoring Program (SIMP) during fiscal year 2023 included over 1.7 billion pounds of seafood with a combined value of more than $6.4 billion in U.S. dollars. NOAA announced delivery of the report on May 31. The SIMP imports represented about 32% by volume and 30% by value of all seafood imports into the United States last year. The decrease in imports subject to SIMP reporting requirements is reflective of the overall decline in imports observed over the past fi...
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Chefs Urge Greater Transparency, Traceability in Seafood Industry
31Jan By Fishermen's NewsNo Comments
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Chefs Urge Greater Transparency, Traceability in Seafood Industry

Pressure from the marine environmental community for greater transparency and traceability in the seafood industry is increasing, with a letter to President Joe Biden urging the federal government to expand the Seafood Import Monitoring Program (SIMP). The current program, requiring catch documentation and traceability for some seafood species at risk of illegal fishing, applies to 13 species and species groups, covering less than half of all U.S. seafood imports. The letter, signed by more than 100 chefs nationwide, urges Biden to expand SIMP to include all species of seafood, requiring importers to report additional catch data, and to include labor conditions in reporting requirements. This program would prevent a “bait and switch” in seafood supply chains, they said, as wel...
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Congressmen Call for Action in Human Rights Abuses in Seafood Supply Chain
25Oct By Fishermen's NewsNo Comments
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Congressmen Call for Action in Human Rights Abuses in Seafood Supply Chain

Two members of the U.S. House of Representatives are calling for federal action in response to investigative reports in The New Yorker magazine documenting human rights abuses in the seafood supply chain in the People’s Republic of China’s fishing fleet and seafood processing centers. Raul M. Grijalva, D-Ariz. and Jared Huffman, D- Calif., voiced their concerns Oct. 20 via letters to U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), the U.S. Department of Commerce and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Their letters referenced reports in The New Yorker that Uyghurs and other Muslim ethnic minorities in the People’s Republic of China are being forced to work throughout the seafood supply chain. They urged Customs and Border Protection officials to use their au...
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Coast Guard Establishes IUU Fishing, Environmental Response Centers in Hawaii
25Oct By Fishermen's NewsNo Comments
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Coast Guard Establishes IUU Fishing, Environmental Response Centers in Hawaii

Two new marine environmental response units were established in Hawaii earlier this month, via ceremonies for the Marine Environmental Response Regional Activities Center (MER RAC) and Illegal Unreported Unregulated Fisheries Center of Expertise (IUUF COE). The Coast Guard said in an Oct. 23 announcement that Vice Adm. Andrew Tiongson, commander, Coast Guard Pacific Area and Rear Adm. Jo-Ann Burdian, Assistant Commandant for Response Policy, presided over the ceremonies on Fort Island, Hawaii, on Oct. 11. The intent, according to the Guard, is to encourage sustained, long-term engagement with partner nations within the Indo-Pacific. “These new detachments, strategically positioned here in Hawaii will fulfill exactly what the Indo-Pacific Strategy directs.” Tiongson said in a s...
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NOAA Report Cites IUU, Forced Labor, Shark Catch Issues
6Sep By Fishermen's NewsNo Comments
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NOAA Report Cites IUU, Forced Labor, Shark Catch Issues

NOAA’s 2023 Report to Congress on Improving International Fisheries Management identifies seven nations and entities engaged in illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing (IUU), including incidents involving force labor and targeted or incidental shark catches. The report, released Aug. 31, said the U.S. will work with identified parties to address IUU issues and forced labor activities and support effective management of protected species and shark catch. “IUU fishing and other unsustainable fishing practices undermine U.S. and global efforts to sustainably manage fisheries and conserve marine resources,” Janet Coit, assistant administrator for NOAA Fisheries, said. “Combating these practices is a top priority of the United States, and we’ll work with each identified nation and ent...
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Study Tracks Shifting Identities of Global Fishing Fleet
25Jan By Fishermen's NewsNo Comments
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Study Tracks Shifting Identities of Global Fishing Fleet

A new international research study has tracked 35,000 commercial fishing and support vessels, identifying their changing of country registration and also identified hotspots of potential unauthorized fishing and activity of foreign owned vessels. Changing the country of origin is a practice also known as “reflagging.” The study, “Tracking Elusive and Shifting Identities of the Global Fishing Fleet,” was published Jan. 18 in Science Advances, the open access multidisciplinary journal of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Participants in the project were researchers from Global Fishing Watch, the Maine Geospatial Ecology lab at Duke University and the Stockholm Resilience Centre. The study found that close to 20% of high seas fishing is done by vessels that are eit...
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NOAA Fisheries Announces Proposed Rule to Expand Seafood Import Monitoring
4Jan By Fishermen's NewsNo Comments
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NOAA Fisheries Announces Proposed Rule to Expand Seafood Import Monitoring

NOAA Fisheries has announced a proposed rule that would expand the Seafood Import Monitoring Program (SIMP), a risk-based program for targeted species of seafood imported into the United States. SIMP currently includes reporting and recordkeeping requirements for nearly half of all seafood imported, in order to combat illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing and misrepresented seafood from entering US commerce. SIMP would provide a screening and deterrent tool for IUU fish and fish products and misrepresented seafood products seeking entry into domestic markets. The rule proposes to expand the species currently subject to SIMP, including red snapper and tuna, to include all species in the snapper family and additional tunas, to minimize the risk of mislabeling and product sub...
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