The legislature yesterday passed the Act Governing Distant Water Fisheries (遠洋漁業條例) as well as amendments to the Fisheries Act (漁業法) and the Ordinance to Govern Investment in the Operation of Foreign Flag Fishing Vessels (投資經營非我國籍漁船管理條例), tightening regulations and raising the fines for illegal fishing, “fish laundering” and other significant violations.
The EU on Oct. 1 last year issued a “yellow card” to Taiwan following the discovery of a Taiwanese fishing vessel violating shark finning regulations in international waters and threatened to issue a “red card,” which could prompt an EU embargo on Taiwanese seafood exports, which would seriously damage the country’s fishing industry, should the nation fail to improve its legal framework and take corrective measures.
The government has since made an effort to work with the legislature to draft a bill governing the nation’s distant water fisheries. The Executive Yuan came to an agreement with the legislature on the draft bill on Monday last week and the legislative caucuses reached a final consensus on Wednesday last week.
Photo: Huang Chien-hua, Taipei Times
The Act Governing Distant Water Fisheries lists 19 activities as “major violations,” including undertaking distant fishing without registration; failing to install a vessel monitoring system and a system to report each vessel’s catch; unloading and transshipping fish and fishing in foreign waters without official approval; counterfeiting and hiding identification markers, such as the name and number of a fishing boat; fishing in excess of the authority’s announced quotas; fishing, possessing, transshipping, unloading or selling banned species; avoiding or obstructing inspection and cooperating with boats that have been undertaking illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing.
The act stipulates that business operators or employees who perpetrate any of the major violations would be severely fined and their fishing permits would be revoked for up to two years. The fines are categorized in proportion to the size of the boat in question.
Boats weighing 500 tonnes and above are to be subject to a fine between NT$6 million and NT$30 million (US$185,862 and US$929,310); boats weighing 100 tonnes to 500 tonnes, between NT$4 million and NT$20 million; boats weighing between 50 tonnes and 100 tonnes, between NT$2 million and NT$10 million; and boats weighing less than 50 tonnes are to be subjected to a fine of between NT$1 million and NT$5 million.
If the fines are “less than the value of seized fishery products, the perpetrator would instead be fined up to five times of the value of the seized products.”
Repeat violations are subject to more severe punishment, the act stipulates.
“Some fishermen might consider the penalties too heavy. However, the act is not established to punish fishermen, but to protect oceanic resources and encourage legal fishing,” Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Sufin Siluko (廖國棟) said.
Amendments to the Ordinance to Govern Investment in the Operation of Foreign Flag Fishing Vessels prohibit Taiwanese from investing in or operating boats that are non-Taiwanese without official permission. If investments are planned for boats that undertake IUU fishing, the permission would not be granted, or, if already granted, would be revoked, according to the amendment.
The amendment also defines “major violations” of its own, similar to those outlined by the Act Governing Distant Water Fisheries.
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