The CNMI environmental officials who attended last month’s Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council meeting in Hawaii said this was the assurance given to them by Wespac.
In Hawaii, Department of Lands and Natural Resources Secretary Ignacio Dela Cruz and other CNMI representatives presented the commonwealth’s marine conservation plan which was subsequently approved by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Pacific Island Regional Office.
In an interview, Dela Cruz said appropriation of the EEZ funds will finance their 11 conservation projects most of them have yet to be implemented.
The Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act of 1996 authorizes the secretary of State to enter into a Pacific Insular Area Fishery Agreement to allow foreign fishing within U.S. EEZs adjacent to any Pacific insular areas like the CNMI, Guam and American Samoa.
This Act does not impose restrictions on the type of species that can be caught by the foreign fishing operations.
However, in the case of CNMI, only pelagic species like tuna, yellow fin tuna can be caught.
The CNMI’s approved marine conservation plan excludes the bottom and reef fish which are believed to be “fully utilized.”
This means that foreign fishing operations cannot catch these species within the EEZ surrounding CNMI.
Under the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act, any amount attributable to fines and penalties imposed on foreign vessels, including sums collected from forfeiture and disposition or sale of property seized, “shall be deposited into the treasury of the Pacific insular area adjacent to the EEZ where the violation occurred.”
