PORTLAND, Maine - Fishing regulators will decide in November whether it's time to reopen Maine's shuttered shrimp fishery.

An arm of the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission plans to meet on Nov. 29 in Portland to determine specifications for the 2018 fishing year. The fishery was shut down in 2013 amid concerns about poor reproduction and declining population.

The shrimp have been largely unavailable to American consumers since the shutdown, though they are also harvested by Canadian fishermen. They were a popular winter seafood item before the fishery was closed. Fishermen also formerly brought some to land in Massachusetts and New Hampshire.

Source: Herald Courier

SEATTLE  - The company whose collapsed net pens released thousands of farmed Atlantic salmon into Puget Sound is planning to stock another marine facility off Bainbridge Island with a million juvenile fish despite a request from the governor not to do so.

Gov. Jay Inslee had asked Cooke Aquaculture not to move fish from its hatchery to other saltwater net pens until the investigation into the Aug. 19 2017 salmon farm collapse at its Cypress Island facility was completed.

Tens of thousands of the non-native fish escaped into Puget Sound after those net pens failed, raising concerns about its impact on native salmon. Meanwhile, three state agencies are investigating what went wrong. That review is expected to be done in December.

Source: SF Gate

An Iranian lawmaker says excessive fishing by Chinese ships in waters off the southern Iranian coasts has affected local fishermen’s livelihoods.

Iranian legislator Ahmad Moradi says overfishing by industrial and Chinese vessels in Iran’s southern waters has drawn the ire of local fishermen whose livelihoods have been affected by the practice.

“As fishermen’s livelihoods are directly linked to fishing for marine animals, Chinese ships should not be allowed to affect domestic catch of fish,” said Moradi, who sits on Parliament’s Energy Commission.

Source: IFP News

Countries across the EU are failing to punish illegal fishing activities and not enforcing fisheries laws properly, new research by environment lawyers ClientEarth find today.

Under the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP), all EU counties must impose sanctions to deter people from breaking fishing laws.

But ClientEarth has found that some EU countries haven’t implemented all the rules that enforce the CFP, including key fishing countries like France, Spain and the Netherlands. This undermines fisheries laws and means there is no level playing field for fishers across the EU.

The number of sanctions against those that break the law is also incredibly low. Authorities are doing little or nothing about illegal fishing.

Press Release

Separate mobile courts in Kushtia and Patuakhali districts have seized a large quantity of current nets and sentenced seven fishermen to different terms in jail for catching Ilish defying the ongoing government ban.

A mobile court in Kushtia sentenced five fishermen to one month’s imprisonment during a drive in different locations of the Padma River in Kushtia’s Kumarkhali upazila on Sunday night.

Kumarkhali police station Officer-in-Charge (OC) Abdul Khaleque confirmed the matter to the Dhaka Tribune on Monday.

The mobile court also seized about 10,000 meter fishing nets during the drive.

Source: Dhaka Tribune

The fisheries Department in Namwala District in Southern province has confiscated over 200 mosquito nets which were used for alleged illegal fishing.

ZANIS reports that Namwala District Fisheries officer Daniel Chilundika confirmed the development in an interview that together with  the Zambia Police, and the Department of National Parks, his department raided a fishing camp called kalweza on Kafue river which made the suspected fishermen to flee after noticing they were being trailed.

Among the items confiscated included 84 Kgs of dry fish, 35 kgs of fresh fish and 19 assorted small sized prohibited fishing nets.

Source: Lusaka Times

The lawsuit over whether the federal government or the state should manage Cook Inlet’s salmon fisheries won’t get its day in the U.S. Supreme Court after all.

Supreme Court justices on Monday denied the state of Alaska’s petition to hear a case in which the Kenai Peninsula-based fishing trade group the United Cook Inlet Drift Association challenged the North Pacific Fishery Management Council’s decision to confer management of the salmon fishery to the state.

Because most of the fishery takes place more than 3 miles from shore, it is within federal jurisdiction and is subject to management and oversight by a federal Fishery Management Plan. In 2012, the North Pacific Fishery Management Council passed an amendment removing fisheries in Cook Inlet, Prince William Sound and the Alaska Peninsula and placing them entirely under state management. UCIDA sued over the decision in 2013, saying the state’s management authority doesn’t comply with the Magnuson-Stevens Fisher Conservation and Management Act.

Source: Peninsula Clarion

MURRAY HARBOUR, P.E.I. -- Someone has stolen more than 100,000 of P.E.I.'s famous oysters.

Police say the theft of CAD 30,000 worth of the mollusk was discovered Sunday in the Murray Harbour North area.

RCMP Sgt. R.C. Gunn says they were illegally taken from an aquaculture operation in the waters there.

He said it's unclear if the oysters have been taken out of the province, but it's one of the many questions that are part of the investigation.

Source: CTV News

The conservation of Seychelles' marine resources and seafood value chains will benefit from a USD 20 million package approved by the World Bank.

The funding comes as part of the Third South West Indian Ocean Fisheries Governance and Shared Growth Project (SWIOFish3), aimed at improving the management of marine areas and fisheries in targeted zones of Seychelles, a 115 island archipelago in the western Indian Ocean.

Seychelles has already initiated a marine spatial planning exercise to expand protected areas and a fisheries management plan for the Mahe Plateau to progressively move from an open-access fishery to a more controlled fishery.

Seychelles' vice president said the World Bank package will help Seychelles achieve its fisheries management plan and its desire to capitalize on its natural resources.

Source: Seychelles News Agency

Amid growing uncertainties in the seafood trade, exporters from India have now a reason to cheer as the country is expected to be the standout performer in 2017 along with Chile.
 
Indian exports is set to surge by 41 per cent more due to bumper harvesting of vannamei shrimp.

"Of the world's major seafood exporters, India and Chile are expected to be the standout performers in 2017. In India's case, bumper harvests of aquacultured vannamei shrimp is the main factor behind expectations of a INR 2.3 billion increase in Indianseafood exports in 2017," said a report by Globefish, which is a unit within the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) of the United Nations.

The report on seafood demand analysed the market situation until June 2017.

Source: Business Standard