Ninh Thuan came up with a good idea to raise fishermen’s awareness

“Small rain lays great dust”

According to Mr. Dang Kim Cuong, Director of Ninh Thuan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, one of the solutions that the provincial authorities apply as an effort against illegal fishing is to regularly converse with fishing vessel owners and fishermen.

And thanks to those conversations, fishermen soon came to understand that if Vietnam still have even one fishing vessel encroaching on foreign waters, removing the IUU yellow card would be near impossible, not to mention the risk of getting a “red card”. Had this risk become real, Vietnam’s fishery products would suffer many hardships when exported to the EU market, and the lives of fishermen would be directly affected.

“Ninh Thuan fishermen have gradually raised their awareness and complied with the provisions of the law on fishing activities of their own free will. As a result, Ninh Thuan has no case of fishing in violation of foreign waters in 2022. Fishermen in the province are very active in implementing regulations on fishing diary recording or when they are docking and leaving ports. All returning ships perform traceability declaration for fishery products according to the law,” said Mr. Dang Kim Cuong.

The number of ships installing monitoring equipment for fishing vessels in Ninh Thuan is 813/817 units, reaching 99.5%. Regarding the 4 ships that have not yet installed the equipment, it is reported that the shipowners have financial difficulties, making a loss in business. The ships are so damaged that they cannot be brought to sea.

Fishing vessels in Ninh Thuan are currently focusing on upgrading fishing machinery and equipment with the aim of achieving high efficiency when operating at sea, meeting the long exploitation time, reducing the loss of products after exploitation and protecting the sea boundaries. All of Ninh Thuan’s fishing vessels are fully equipped with adequate paperwork and safety equipment for the crew and ship and make sure that cruise monitoring equipment is maintained during fishing activities at sea.

Closer coordination with related units

In addition to effectively implementing Directive 45/CT-TTg dated December 13, 2017 of the Prime Minister on a number of urgent tasks and solutions to overcome the EC's warning against IUU fishing, Ninh Thuan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development also has certain aims to develop the fishing industry in a sustainable way.

Ninh Thuan's agriculture sector focuses on appropriate orientation, arrangement and structure of occupations, gradually reducing and eliminating unsustainable fishing businesses. Offshore fishing continued to be promoted. At the same time, Ninh Thuan's agriculture sector mobilizes resources to build fishing ports and wharves, develops logistics services and diversifies post-harvest processed products, helping fishermen feel secure to go out at sea and increase their incomes.

The information dissemination work for contents related to IUU fishing is being carried out proactively. The provincial authorities are also mobilized to coordinate with Ninh Thuan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development to apply specific sanctions so that fishing vessels in the area must install cruise monitoring equipment and strictly comply with regulations.

In 2023, Ninh Thuan’s agriculture sector will consult the Provincial People's Committee to issue a plan to implement the scheme "Preventing and combating illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing by 2025".

The plan is to implement “The 2022-2025 National Program on developing effective and sustainable fishing - vision to 2030". In which, the provincial agriculture sector will focus on solutions for information and communication work. As for fleet management, it is deemed essential to ensure the smooth handling of administrative procedures for fishing vessels in compliance with regulations. 100% of fishing vessels will be marked according to the planned time, 100% of fishing vessels in regulations will be installed with cruise monitoring equipment. Sea control units will regularly organize fishing vessel monitoring, update data on the national fishery database, and strengthen inspection work at ports.

Binh Dinh People's Committee has recently issued a document to 12 coastal provinces from Quang Nam to Kien Giang to coordinate in managing fishing vessels in Binh Dinh province at high risk of IUU fishing violations.

For Binh Dinh fishing vessels that have been sold to new owners in other provinces but have yet to change the owner’s name, Binh Dinh requested the competent authorities not to issue procedures for disembarkation for fishing and quickly notify the new ship owner to change the name and register the fishing vessel in the home province for management. Other provinces should coordinate and support the delegation of Binh Dinh province in inspecting the conditions of fishing vessels and not allow fishing vessels that are not eligible to go out for fishing activities.