Deploying peak month against illegal fishing

(Baohatinh.vn) - Peak month to combat illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing and sustainably develop Vietnam's fisheries industry towards the goal of removing the EC's yellow card warning in 2025.

Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh signed Decision No. 2310/QD-TTg promulgating the "Action Plan for the peak month against illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing and sustainable development of Vietnam's fisheries industry.

Ha Tinh authorities propagate to fishermen not to violate illegal exploitation in foreign waters.

Resolutely handle violations of IUU regulations

The decision clearly states the viewpoint of launching a peak period, resolutely and thoroughly handling violations of IUU regulations; preventing and not allowing fishing vessels to illegally exploit in foreign waters; striving to have no more violations of losing VMS connection for more than 6 hours without reporting position to shore, losing connection for more than 10 days without returning the vessel to shore, or exceeding the permitted boundary for exploitation at sea by November 15, 2025.

Focus on converting from banned fishing to other fishing occupations to protect aquatic resources, from fishing to aquaculture (especially high-tech marine aquaculture) and other occupations to ensure jobs, income and livelihoods for people; digital transformation, comprehensively digitizing the management process of aquatic exploitation activities on electronic platforms.

The plan's objective is to concentrate resources on implementing urgent and key tasks and solutions to thoroughly resolve existing problems and limitations in combating IUU fishing, implementing EC recommendations and preparing to work with the EC's 5th Inspection Team to ensure the best results, determined to remove the "Yellow Card" warning in this inspection.

Tight control of fishing vessels and fishermen

Urgent and key tasks and solutions by November 15, 2025 are: Completing fisheries law regulations; fleet management; controlling fishing vessel activities; tracing the origin of exploited aquatic products; enforcing the law and handling violations.

Ha Tinh tightens management of fishing vessels, determined to remove the IUU "yellow card".

Regarding the control of fishing vessel activities, the Prime Minister requested strict control of fishing vessels and fishermen at their place of residence, ensuring that the addresses of all vessel owners, fishermen and fishing vessel operating areas are clearly understood in connection with the national population database; applying the system for managing fishing vessels and fishermen entering and leaving ports on the VNeID platform to control all fishing vessels and fishermen leaving ports to participate in fishing activities and ending their voyages; applying the system for automatically reporting fishing vessel locations when the VMS system connection at sea is lost so that fishermen know to comply with legal regulations...

Ha Tinh has 3,980 fishing vessels with a length of 6m or more registered and updated to the VNFishbase system; deregistered 993 inactive fishing vessels and achieved 100% of the fishing vessel marking rate according to regulations; 100% of fishing vessels with a length of 15m or more operating in offshore areas have installed VMS equipment...

Synchronously deploy the electronic fishing logbook, purchasing and transport system (e-logbook) and the eCDT system at all fishing ports.

Regarding the traceability of exploited aquatic products, for domestically exploited aquatic products: Complete, guide, apply and synchronously deploy the system of exploitation logs, electronic purchase and transport logs (e-logbooks) and the eCDT system at all fishing ports (including private fishing ports); upgrade information technology infrastructure (desktop computers, tablets, internet connection) at fishing ports to support fishermen in updating data to the VNeID system, border guards, e-logbooks, and eCDT.

All fishermen, seafood purchasing facilities, processing enterprises, fishing ports and state management agencies of fisheries must monitor the volume of seafood unloaded through ports and traceability records of seafood on the e-logbook and eCDT systems.

Ensure that all fishing vessels with a length of 15m or more participating in fishing activities leave and dock on eCDT at fishing ports and use the electronic fishing log system according to the instructions of the Ministry of Agriculture and Environment.

In Ha Tinh, the work of controlling fishing vessels entering and leaving fishing ports in the area has applied information technology in management. Management units support fishermen and businesses to implement the electronic traceability system for exploited aquatic products (eCDT ) . Through this system, procedures such as approving fishing vessels entering and leaving ports; submitting fishing logs; recording loading and unloading output; issuing receipts, raw material certificates and certificates of aquatic product origin can all be done online. Since the beginning of the year, the whole province has had 1,647 ships arriving at ports and 1,679 ships leaving ports using electronic procedures (eCDT), contributing to improving management efficiency, information transparency and meeting traceability requirements according to regulations of the European Commission (EC).

For imported aquatic products exploited under the PSMA Agreement and by container ships: Establish contact channels with regional fisheries organizations, flag states, and license-granting countries to verify and compare information on vessel management, exploitation licenses, transshipment, etc.; arrange sufficient resources (funding, personnel, equipment, etc.) to check records, monitor the volume and species composition of imported aquatic products at seaports, at seafood processing and exporting factories; purchase information, access international databases to verify and compare information on vessels and aquatic products exploited and imported into Vietnam, etc.

Source: https://baohatinh.vn/trien-khai-thang-cao-diem-chong-khai-thac-hai-san-bat-hop-phap-post297873.html