Fishing boats docking at a port in Nam Dinh (Photo: VNA)
The People’s Committee of the northern province of Nam Dinh has asked provincial departments, sectors, and coastal localities to make sure that 100% of the fishing boats install the vessel monitoring systems (VMSs) and stay continuously connected.
The move aims to put an end to the situation of VMS disconnection among local fishing vessels. According to the committee, 99% of the local fishing vessels have installed the VMSs. However, there are still cases of fishing boats losing VMS connection while operating at sea.
The committee asked coastal localities to maintain 24/24 supervision over local fishing vessels via the VMSs, detecting and preventing illegal operations on foreign waters, contributing to combating illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing
In the first seven months of 2024, the provincial Department of Agriculture and Rural Department detected 179 fishing boats losing connections for over six hours and 80 others having no signals for more than 10 days in operations.
Vice Director of the department Tran Duc Viet said that the province found three vessels committing violations in VMS installation and connection.
Meanwhile, local authorities have imposed administrative punishments on 97 IUU fishing violation cases with a total fine of 1.14 billion VND (45,770 USD)./.
