Taiwan is set to gain membership of a new convention regarding fishing resource management in the North Pacific that is expected to take effect later this year, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said Thursday.
The Convention on the Conservation and Management of High Seas Fisheries Resources in the North Pacific Ocean is expected to come into effect by the end of 2014, and Taiwan will apply for membership, said Tom Chou, director-general of the ministry’s Department of International Organizations.
Membership will allow Taiwan to participate in the process of formulating fishing regulations in the region, such as quotas for Pacific saury, he said at a regular news briefing. Taiwan is the largest catcher of Pacific saury in the North Pacific, he added.
It will also strengthen cooperation between Taiwan and other countries, Chou said.
Countries expected to be members of the convention include Canada, China, Japan, South Korea, Russia and the United States, according to the ministry.
Taiwan has the world’s sixth-largest deep-sea fishing fleet, with more than 2,000 deep-sea vessels operating in the Pacific, Indian and Atlantic oceans, Chou said.
Taiwan is also a member of various regional fishery management organizations, including the International Scientific Committee for Tuna and Tuna-like Species in the North Pacific Ocean; the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission; the Inter-American Tropical Tuna Commission; and the South Pacific Regional Fisheries Management Organisation.
The Central News Agency