Politics

Taipei, Beijing to ink pact on fishery cooperation

• Publication Date：09/15/2009
• Source： Commercial Times

Fishing authorities from both sides of the Taiwan Strait have recommended that a Fishing Cooperation Agreement be signed between Taiwan’s Straits Exchange Foundation and the mainland’s Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait, it has been announced.

The agreement would cover such questions as maritime safety, conservation of fishing resources and increased exchanges between the two sides.

The announcement was made Sept. 14 by the Fisheries Agency of the Council of Agriculture under the Executive Yuan. In making the announcement, the agency noted that Li Jianhua, the head of the mainland Chinese Fisheries Council, had led a six-member delegation on a visit to Taiwan during the week of Sept. 5-12.

During Li’s visit, the two sides reached general consensus on a number of broad issues, including: the setting up of a dispute-resolving mechanism; establishing a system that would help ships in distress; creating an information exchange mechanism which would correct illegal practices in a timely manner; and increasing “mutually beneficial and complementary” exchanges.

Because there is a great deal of overlap in the territories that fishermen from the two sides of the Taiwan Strait operate in, there have been a number of disputes in the past. Thus far, however, there have been no proper channels that allow these disputes and other fishing-related questions to be resolved.

The two sides also held discussions on protecting resources, though no consensus was reached in this regard. Mainland fishing authorities have recommended that Taiwanese fishermen practice fishing moratoriums, which would allow depleted fish stock to grow.

In response to the request, the FA noted that Taiwan has already offered a number of inducements that encourage Taiwanese fishermen to practice fishing moratoriums, and that in some areas of the sea fishing moratoriums are legally binding; but fishing customs in Taiwan are such that it will not be possible at the moment for Taiwan to compel its fishermen to carry out the same kind of all-encompassing fishing moratoriums that are found in the mainland.

Taiwanese authorities also complained that mainland fishermen practice trawl net fishing, which causes extensive ecological harm. In response, Li noted that in the short term it will also be impossible to impose a complete ban of trawling, but that steps will be taken to reduce the practice.

The two sides also agreed that laws prohibiting practices as electrocuting, poisoning and blasting fish will be enforced more strictly in the future. Ecologically harmful fishing techniques will be more tightly controlled as well. (HZW)