Binh Thuan to combine seafood exploitation and protecting island sovereignty

The Department of Agriculture and Rural Development said that our province has more than 7,800 fishing vessels and over 46,000 fishermen directly participating in seafood exploitation with an annual seafood exploitation output of 225-230 thousand tons. The province's coastal and coastal fishing grounds are about 14,000 km² wide. However, illegal seafood exploitation and violations of regulations on the protection of aquatic resources (including fishing vessels inside and outside the province) in the province's waters still occur. The fly-crushing profession operates in the wrong direction in some places and is sometimes complicated, causing frustration for fishermen. In particular, despite the efforts of the entire political system from the province to the grassroots, the situation of fishing vessels and fishermen illegally exploiting seafood in foreign waters has not been completely prevented and stopped, emerged as a group of fishing vessels that frequently stay and depart outside the province at high risk.

The Border Guard distributed leaflets and propagated legal regulations in seafood exploitation to fishermen.

Therefore, in recent times, the coordination between fisheries management agencies and the provincial Border Guard force in carrying out the task of protecting sovereignty, security, and order in the province's waters and state management of marine fisheries has increased. Fishery activities and the protection of aquatic resources are always paid attention to and maintained regularly and closely. In particular, the work of propagandizing sea and island sovereignty associated with preventing illegal fishing and not infringing on foreign waters is identified as an important and top political task; thus contributing to raising people's awareness in the province about the position and role of Vietnam's seas and islands in the cause of building and protecting the Fatherland; creating firmly trust, consensus, and unanimity among the people on the Party's guidelines, policies and opinions, and the State's policies and laws related to the sea and islands.

With the responsibility of playing a key role, in directly preventing and combating illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) seafood exploitation, especially preventing fishing vessels in the province from exploiting illegal seafood in foreign waters, the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, the Provincial Border Guard Command has advised the Provincial Party Committee and People's Committee on many documents directing the implementation of anti-IUU fishing and organizing propaganda. At the same time, they coordinate effectively to handle practical issues arising in connection with the management and control of conditions for operating fishing vessels (registration, inspection, exploitation licenses, safety equipment for fishing vessels, crew members' certificate, etc.); control and ensure security and order of fishing activities at sea and anchorages, fishing ports.

In addition, the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development and the Provincial Border Guard Command also coordinate with local coastal authorities to mobilize boat owners to participate in establishing production groups and teams at sea. To date, the entire province has established and is maintaining 158 solidarity groups/1,530 ships with 7,744 workers. The consolidation and development of production groups and teams at sea have facilitated the dissemination of the Party's policies and State laws to the people, helping functional agencies and localities firmly update the marine situations, measuring, managing, and handling issues of national security and defense, natural disaster prevention, and search and rescue works in time.

At the same time, the province effectively deploys the Government's policies to support fishermen operating in remote waters. Therefore, the number of large-capacity fishing vessels registered to participate in remote waters continues to increase. From 2019 up to now, Binh Thuan has supported provincial fishermen to exploit remote seas according to Decision 48 of the Prime Minister with an amount of over 800 billion VND, of which 786 billion VND fuel support. In addition, the province also helps fishermen reduce their difficulties and maintains production; the presence of fishermen in remote sea areas has increased, combining production with protecting sea and island sovereignty.