Index increases, risk of violations still exists
On December 14, the Department of Agriculture and Environment said that the implementation of the task of combating IUU fishing in the province is showing positive signs. The whole province currently has 4,664 fishing vessels from 6m or more, 100% of which have been registered.
The inspection work reached 92.9% with 1,574/1,693 ships having completed procedures; there are still 119 expired ships, of which 25 ships are actually no longer there and 94 ships are still there but have not been re-inspected.
The issuance of exploitation licenses reached 97.9% with 4,568 licensed vessels, while 96 vessels had not been issued. The food safety certificate reached 96.2%, the installation of voyage monitoring devices (VMS) reached 98.9% with 1,342/1,356 ships installed.
The province also strictly controls groups of fishing vessels that are not qualified to operate. There are currently 164 ships of this class, of which 25 are no longer practical; 139 ships are still there but do not meet the operating conditions. The People's Committees at the commune level have sealed, marked the identification and sent officers to supervise, not allowing this group of ships to leave the port.
The 24/7 fishing vessel monitoring system continues to be maintained. When discovering a ship losing connection or operating near the border, the on-duty officers promptly warn the ship owner and captain. At the time of reporting, no vessels were detained in the province due to violating foreign waters.
Regarding administrative sanctions, 3 violations have been handled in the past: one ship lost VMS connection for more than 6 hours, one ship crossed the border and another violation. The total fine is 129 million VND. Accumulated from 2024 to present, 274 ships have been handled, with a total fine of more than 6.9 billion VND and 1 case/1 defendant has been criminally prosecuted.
In addition to the achieved results, the report also mentioned many worrying shortcomings: 139 fishing vessels that are not qualified to operate still exist; 25 vessels are no longer there but have not been registered. There are still 2 ships that have lost VMS connection that are being verified.
Some indicators related to documents, licenses, and inspection renewals are still slow; additional ships have expired documents during the week due to ship trading but have not re- renewed procedures. The unification of fishing vessel data between VNFishbase, VNeID software and the Border Guard database is still different.
Request to tighten management
The Department of Agriculture and Environment proposes many key solutions for next week, including: continuing to seal unqualified fishing vessels; requiring commune-level People's Committees to closely monitor and not allow them to go to sea; unifying fishing vessel data between forces; urgently issuing missing documents to qualified vessel owners; 24/7 monitoring on the VMS system and promptly handling arising violations.
Border Guard forces are assigned to continue to strictly control ships entering and leaving ports, handling ships crossing borders or losing VMS connection.
At fishing ports, the fishing control force has increased supervision of vessels with signs of violations; requiring type 3 ports to fully implement the monitoring regime and collect fishing logs.
Vice Chairman of the People's Committee of Quang Tri province Le Van Bao requested departments, branches, and People's Committees at the commune level to organize inspections and supervise the implementation of combating IUU fishing according to Regulation 366-QD/TW; strictly handle acts of lax management.
At the same time, the Department of Agriculture and Environment must closely coordinate with localities to guide fishermen to complete documents, extend documents, update the list of unqualified vessels; promptly notify localities of vessels whose documents are about to expire for proactive management.
Mr. Le Van Bao also noted that the Chairman of the People's Committee at the commune level must absolutely monitor unqualified vessels, publicize the list for people to monitor; continue to propagate to raise awareness of fishermen in complying with the fight against IUU fishing.
