The federal cabinet has decided that deep sea fishing in Zone-III will be regulated by the federal government and would be open to provinces for obtaining licences, official sources told Business Recorder. The decision was taken by the cabinet in its meeting held on March 31, 2018 under the chairmanship of Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi.
The cabinet was informed that clause 36 of the Fourth Schedule to the Federal Legislative List Part I in the Constitution lists "Fishing and Fisheries beyond territorial waters" within the jurisdiction of the Federal Government. The limits of territorial waters had been specified in terms of the UN Convention on Law of Seas (UNCLOS), 1982 and the Territorial Waters and Maritime Zones Act, 1976 as twelve nautical miles beyond the land territory and internal waters of Pakistan measured from the baseline. Accordingly, the Federal Government was authorized to regulate deep sea fishing, ie, beyond 12 nautical miles from the baseline, up till the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) stretching 200 nautical miles across our coastline.
According to sources, the Prime Minister had constituted a committee to revise and formulate New Deep Sea Fishing Policy. Furthermore, it was directed that no deep sea fishing licenses should be issued until the introduction of a new policy framework and even then only if the criteria set out in the new framework allowed for the issuance of such licenses. The committee after due deliberations and keeping in view the overall status of our depleted fishing stocks proposed clear guidelines and measures to improve our fishing practices through sustainable fishing which had been proposed in the new policy. The draft policy was shared with the governments of Sindh and Balochistan being the stakeholders.
The cabinet was briefed that feedback received from the provincial Governments were based on incorrect assertion that all fishing practices, monitoring, management, etc, including deep sea fishing, fell within their jurisdiction and the Federal Government may only assist through its advisory role without any regulatory function. This policy catered for Zone-III only which was the exclusive domain of the Federal Government. During the course of discussion, it was mentioned that the policy should include broad based periodic goals and targets with respect to employment generation, extent of value addition and increase in exports. Certain international standards needed to be embedded in the policy which was not inconsistent with the terminology used in UNCLOS.
It was pointed out that as the provinces had shown their reservations to this policy, the federal government should make a broad-based Fishing Policy in consultation with them. Furthermore, the proposed policy also dealt in detail with licencing regime therefore, it would be appropriate to rename it as Deep Sea Fishing Licensing Policy. It was pointed out that Article 172(2) of the Constitution fully empowered the Federal Government to make deep sea policy, whereas the provinces were not amenable to the Idea of making a generalized fishing policy.
The cabinet was further informed that announcement of this policy would help the Federal Government in regulating deep sea fishing sector in the country by introducing licensing and enforcement regimes which would ensure sustainable deep sea fishing practices and replenish our depleted fish stocks. The enforcement would largely be done in collaboration with the Maritime Security Agency. After detailed discussion, the cabinet approved Deep Sea Fishing Licencing Policy 2018. The cabinet also decided that Zone-III to be regulated by the Federal Government through this policy would be open to all provinces for obtaining licences and the number of licences would be rationalised.
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