Saving Seafood

Blue Boat Captains Held In Solomons Claims They Are Trafficking Victims

July 6, 2017 — The three captains of the blue boats who entered our waters and stole our marine resources say they are victims of human trafficking.

This was revealed yesterday by their lawyer Public Solicitor Douglas Hou in the High Court during the mitigation and sentencing submissions of their case.

Mr Hou also told the court upon the instructions of Do Van Va, Vo Van Vi, and Nguyen Nguyen that they are not captains of the three blue boats but were merely operating the vessel at that time when they were caught.

“The whole team could actually navigate the vessel,” Mr Hou said in mitigation.

“These three accused are the unfortunate ones tasked to operate the vessel when they were caught.”

He submitted that the period served in custody should not be long as it would be unfair on the three accused now victims as other crew members of the blue boats had already went home.

He said all 40 crew members who have already returned to Vietnam and these three accused have equal roles in operating the boats and it would be unfair for the three accused if they served long period in prison.

Mr Hou said the three accused are victims of human trafficking used by the owners of the blue boats.

Read the full story at the Pacific Islands Report

HÉCTOR SOLDI: Clear waters, clear hearts: Now is the time for more transparency in our oceans

July 5, 2017 — Last month, leaders from around the world gathered in New York City for the United Nations’ Ocean Conference. The UN Ocean Conference was an opportunity for countries to discuss how we will implement one of the organization’s key conservation goals — how to “conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources for sustainable development.”

As Peru’s vice minister of fisheries and aquaculture, I came to the UN Ocean Conference to announce a major new transparency measure we are undertaking to demonstrate our commitment to sustainable management of our marine resources.

Peru is making its national vessel tracking data publicly available through Global Fishing Watch, an organization that provides the first global view of commercial fishing activity. Global Fishing Watch already uses public broadcast data collected by satellite and terrestrial receivers to show the movement of vessels over time and identify fishing activity. The addition of our government’s data to the platform will provide the world with an even clearer view of fishing activity in our oceans.

We are also pleased to have been joined by Indonesia, which fulfilled a similar transparency commitment the country made in 2015. Indonesia’s vessel tracking data is now public and available for the first time through Global Fishing Watch.

Read the full opinion piece at The Hill

Selling for as high as $2,600 a pound, baby eels have changed fortunes for Maine’s fishermen — and brought trouble

July 5, 2017 — On tidal rivers and streams that course through coastal Maine, where salt- and freshwater collide, people wearing headlamps are flocking to the water’s edge in the middle of the night like 19th-century miners sifting the earth for specks of gold. They’re searching for baby eels, better known as elvers, pound for pound one of the most expensive live fish in the world.

The first time Julie Keene caught $33,000 worth of baby eels in a single night, she started crying because she thought she’d done something wrong. She hauled her bucket of eels up the riverbank in the darkness and handed it off to a buyer, who tried to give her a thick wad of cash in exchange for the squirming pile of translucent sea creatures, which look like long, skinny tadpoles. At first, though, she was too frightened to take the money.

“We’re really poor and stuff. We dig clams,” she explains. “You see something like that and you go — I mean, you can’t fathom it. It’s like they told you you just won the Powerball or something. You think, Oh my god, you know, I’m gonna be able to make some money.”

Keene is smoking a cigarette and pacing the muddy banks of the Penobscot River, where everybody says the eels are running so thick at night they look like a blue oil slick in the light of the moon. It’s early evening at the end of May, and the river is a dull gray, tipped with white where the current churns up through the middle. Across the water, up on a hill, is the red-brick silhouette of downtown Bangor, Maine.

Keene, who is 58 years old, has a weathered, weary face and reddish-blond hair tucked under a baseball cap. She’s spent her entire life on the water, working as a harbormaster, clam warden, shrimper, scallop dragger, and fish cutter, among other jobs. She paces anxiously in her muddy rubber waders, stealing glances at the river, fretting that we haven’t seen any eels yet. Earlier this afternoon, she told me to drive down a private dead-end road that led to this secluded fishing spot and warned that I could not, under any circumstances, put the specific location in writing. Elver fishermen are notoriously secretive about where they fish, for reasons both competitive (why give up the map in a treasure hunt?) and cautious (you never know who might creep up behind you in the dark).

Read the full story at the Boston Globe

Can Sustainability Commitments Get Slavery Out of Seafood?

June 30, 2017 — In 2015, more than 2,000 enslaved fishermen were rescued from brutal conditions in the seas around Indonesia. Some had been savagely beaten while others had been kept in cages. Slave labor was found off these fishing boats as well: In one scenario, seafood workers were forced to peel frozen shrimp for 16 hours a day.

Wracked by these and other stories in the Pulitzer Prize-winning series from the Associated Press chronicling slavery, abysmal working conditions, and restricted freedoms, the extent of the abuse was shocking given the seafood industry’s recent global focus on environmental sustainability. However, existing seafood labels—most notably, the blue Marine Steward Council label—focus almost exclusively on the management and environmental impact of fisheries. These traceability standards largely neglect workforce concerns.

Early actions from the complex web of seafood suppliers, distributors, and retailers to address human rights abuses were fragmented and ineffective at best. For example, a European Union threat to ban seafood imports from Thailand led Thai authorities to enact legislation to combat illegal fishing and prevent underage labor, and arrest more than 100 people on human rights violations. But watchdog groups continued to find abuses months later.

Over the last year, members of social responsibility and environmental non-governmental organizations met with leading academics and business leaders to hash out key elements necessary to achieve socially responsible seafood. The primary objectives—protecting human rights, ensuring equitable production, and improving food security for resource-dependent communities—were detailed at the beginning of June in the journal Science.

“It’s not enough to be slavery-free,” said Jack Kittinger, senior director of the Global Fisheries and Aquaculture Program at Conservation International and co-author of the paper. “There are other social issues—notably gender equity and livelihood security—that need to be tackled as well,” he added.

Read the full story at Civil Eats

Portland seafood company fined over $550,000 for illegally importing urchins

June 29, 2017 — A Portland seafood company has been fined more than $550,000 for violating import laws.

ISF Trading Company, located on Hobsons Wharf at 390 Commercial St., was also ordered to forfeit nearly $300,000 and was put on probation for a year by federal District Court Judge John A. Woodcock Jr. for violating the Lacey Act, the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Portland said.

The Lacey Act prohibits trading in wildlife that has been illegally caught, owned, transported or sold.

According to federal prosecutors, ISF bought sea urchins from a supplier in Canada that wasn’t allowed, under Canadian law, to export seafood. ISF then brought the urchins into the U.S., using labels from another Canadian supplier which, at times, was allowed to export the urchins, prosecutors say.

ISF was charged with illegally importing about 48,000 pounds of sea urchins between Dec. 31, 2010, and Feb. 1, 2011. Prosecutors said the processed roe from the urchins was worth at least $172,800.

Read the full story at the Portland Press Herald

Seafood Traceability Rule to Remain in Place, Says Court

June 28, 2017 — As reported previously on this blog, concerns about illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) seafood fraud, led to a proposed rule to establish a traceability program for certain seafood species. The final rule establishing the Seafood Import Monitoring Program was published by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), Department of Commerce, in the December 9, 2016 Federal Register.

The Program established permitting, data reporting and recordkeeping requirements for the importation of certain priority fish and fish products—including abalone, several types of cod and tuna, red snapper, shrimp and swordfish—that were identified as being especially vulnerable to seafood fraud. The rule requires seafood importers to trace the origin of the fish they import to either the specific boat that caught the full fish or a “single collection point,” to the day the fish was caught, and to the sector of the specific ocean where the fish was caught.

On January 6, 2017, the National Fisheries Institute, Alfa International Seafood, Inc. and others filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia challenging what they called a “Midnight Final Rule.” In the suit, the plaintiffs questioned whether the Department of Commerce cut corners by, among other things, refusing to disclose for public comment the data that it relied on to identify the seafood species subject to the rule and by allowing “a low-level bureaucrat to issue a binding final rule absent a valid delegation of authority from the Secretary.”

In a June 22, 2017 ruling, Judge Amit P. Mehta did not overturn the final rule establishing the Seafood Import Monitoring Program. Rather, Judge Mehta wrote: “The proper course at this juncture—just months before the rule goes into effect—is to defer ruling on Plaintiffs’ broader challenge to the agency’s authority to engage in rule-making and, instead, afford the federal defendants an opportunity to submit a signed statement from a principal officer within the Department of Commerce that ratifies the rule.”

Read the full story at The National Law Review

Maine man pleads guilty to illegal trafficking in baby eels valued at $375K

June 20, 2017 — A 38-year-old Woolwich man pleaded guilty on Friday to illegally trafficking in poached elvers — juvenile American eels — in 2012.

Michael Squillace pleaded guilty to violating the federal Lacey Act, which prohibits interstate transport or transactions of any species of fish or wildlife illegally harvested or handled in any state. He was released on personal recognizance, according to court documents. A sentencing date was not available on Monday. He faces up to five years in prison with a maximum of 3 years supervised release.

Prosecutors from the U.S. Department of Justice’s Environment and Natural Resources Division and Environmental Crimes Section said Squillace illegally sold 183 pounds of elvers, valued at about $375,000, to an unnamed Maine elver dealer.

Since 2011, elvers on average have fetched around $1,500 per pound for fishermen, and netted more than $4 million total for the 12 convicted poachers who have pleaded guilty to federal charges in South Carolina, Virginia and Maine.

Squillace is the sixth midcoast Maine man to be charged with selling poached elvers in recent years, most as part of a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service investigation dubbed “Operation Broken Glass,” which has spanned across 11 states on the East Coast. Eleven people so far have pleaded guilty to federal charges filed in Maine, South Carolina and Virginia, and have admitted to trafficking in more than $2.75 million worth of illegally harvested elvers, according to federal prosecutors.

In March, William Sheldon, 71, of Woolwich, a longtime commercial elver dealer operating as Kennebec Glass Eels pleaded not guilty to trafficking in elvers between 2011 and 2014.

Read the full story at the Bangor Daily News

LOUISIANA: Illegal Sale of Snapper Leads to Drug Charges

June 20, 2017 — Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries enforcement agents cited two men for alleged commercial fishing and drug violations on June 18 in Terrebonne Parish.

Agents cited Arthur Freeman, 53, of Lockport, for selling fish without a commercial wholesale dealer’s license, failing to complete a trip ticket, possession of marijuana, and failing to comply with the individual fishing quota (IFQ) program for by not giving a three hour notification of selling red snapper, not getting a IFQ confirmation number and not reporting his IFQ landing. Agents arrested Ross Adam, 33, of Grand Isle, for possession of meth, drug paraphernalia and being in possession of a firearm while in possession of an illegal controlled substance. Adam was booked into the Terrebonne Parish Jail.

Agents received a tip about two men trying to illegally sell red snapper at a seafood dock in Dulac. Agents arrived on scene and found a vessel with Freeman and Adam on board with eight red snappers totaling 69 pounds. Agents learned that Freeman was attempting to sell the fish for $3 a pound without having a commercial wholesale dealer’s license nor a completed trip ticket.

Agents also found that Freeman did not give the proper three hour notification for the IFQ program and subsequently did not receive a IFQ confirmation number and failed to report the caught red snapper.

Upon inspection of the vessel, agents also found Freeman in possession of marijuana and Adam in possession of meth, two pipes, and a rifle and pistol. Agents seized the snapper and sold them to the highest bidder and the firearms.

Possession of methamphetamine carries up to a $5,000 fine and five years in jail. Possession of marijuana and drug paraphernalia brings up to a $500 fine and six months in jail. Possession of a firearm while in possession of illegal drugs carries up to a $10,000 fine and five to 10 years of prison.

Selling fish without a wholesale dealer’s license and failing to complete a trip ticket each brings a $250 to $500 fine and up to 90 days in jail for each offense. Failing to give a three hour notification, receive a IFQ confirmation number and report the red snapper each brings a $100 to $350 fine and up to 60 days in jail for each offense.

Read the full story at The Outdoor Wire

INSIDE THE MULTI-MILLION-DOLLAR WORLD OF EEL TRAFFICKING

June 13, 2017 — The alleged kingpin of one of the biggest domestic wildlife smuggling operations ever to hit the East Coast is exactly where you’d expect to find him on a rainy evening in early May: firmly planted in a swivel chair at a big green metal desk inside his renovated Quonset hut on Foster Street, in Ellsworth, Maine.

At this post Bill Sheldon waits day and night for fishermen to come and fill his bowl with writhing masses of baby eels.

The 72-year-old fisherman wears glasses, a blue flannel shirt, jeans, duck boots, and a brown L.L. Bean baseball cap. His cell phone goes quack, quack, quack when it rings. The sign above his head reads, “Buying Glass Eels Here,” with the day’s market price: $1,250 per pound. The eel bowl sits atop a digital scale on a small, four-legged table. Nearby a scented candle burns in a glass jar (“to cut the fish smell”).

Grandfatherly and laid-back, Sheldon doesn’t look the part of a serious criminal. But on March 30, one week after the start of Maine’s 10-week-long eel fishing season, Sheldon and another man, Timothy Lewis, were indicted for illegally trafficking wildlife. They pleaded not guilty.

According to court documents, Lewis, 46, is charged with two felonies involved with conspiring to unlawfully launder eels up and down the East Coast. Sheldon, who operated a business called Kennebec Glass Eels at his home in Woolwich, a motel in Ellsworth, and a rental house in Moncks Corner, South Carolina, is up against more serious charges: seven counts of conspiracy to smuggle eels while violating laws in seven states (Maine, New Jersey, Delaware, Virginia, Massachusetts, North Carolina, and South Carolina).

For each felony, Sheldon faces a maximum sentence of a $250,000 fine and up to five years in prison, as well as the forfeiture of any related vessels, equipment, and vehicles, including a black 2012 Ford F450 with the license plate EELWGN. (He preemptively sold the truck but kept the vanity plate.) Sheldon and Lewis are scheduled for separate hearings in July.

For now, Sheldon is free to buy eels for a newly formed company, Maine Eel Trade & Aquaculture, which opened in 2015, with purchasing locations in Waldoboro, Portland, Steuben, and the Quonset hut in Ellsworth.

Read the full story at National Geographic

Peru Commits to Make National Vessel Tracking Data Publicly Available

June 9, 2017 — SEAFOOD NEWS — The Peruvian government made a commitment to make its national vessel tracking data publicly available through Global Fishing Watch, which provides the first global view of commercial fishing activity.

The commitment was announced at The Ocean Conference hosted by the United Nations in New York City and is the result of Oceana’s collaboration with the Peruvian government to increase transparency of commercial fishing in Peru’s waters.

“Peru has committed to join Global Fishing Watch as a demonstration of transparency,” said Héctor Soldi, Vice Minister of Fisheries and Aquaculture for Peru’s Ministry of Production. “This technology platform, based on satellite data from fishing vessels to create a global vision of commercial fishing, enables anyone to follow fishing activity anywhere on the oceans. This is another demonstration of the Peruvian government’s commitment to fight illegal activities at sea and promote the sustainable use of the extraordinary marine productivity on our coastline. The Peruvian government intends to make the utmost effort to achieve the sustainable management of our fisheries in order to increase its contribution to nutrition and global food security.”

Global Fishing Watch uses public broadcast data from the Automatic Identification System (AIS), collected by satellite and terrestrial receivers, to show the movement of vessels over time. Global Fishing Watch uses this information to track vessel movement and classify it as “fishing” or “non-fishing” activity. While AIS is required for the largest vessels that catch a disproportionately large amount of fish, adding Vessel Monitoring System (VMS) data, which is required by some governments, to the Global Fishing Watch platform will provide the world with an even clearer view of fishing activity on our oceans. Together, AIS and VMS data offer the most accurate and comprehensive dataset. The announcement today will improve the information available to governments, fishery managers, seafood suppliers and buyers, journalists, researchers, nonprofit organizations and citizens around the world.

“Oceana has worked closely with the Peruvian government to convey the importance of transparency on our oceans, especially with regard to fishing activities,” said Patricia Majluf, Vice President of Oceana Peru. “Everyone should have access to the most comprehensive data available to best manage our fisheries and protect our ocean resources. Combined with Peru’s vessel tracking data, Global Fishing Watch will offer an invaluable depiction of what is happening in our waters. This is a huge step for Peru to emerge as a world leader in promoting transparency at sea.”

Funding partners for Global Fishing Watch include the Leonardo DiCaprio Foundation, Marisla Foundation, Bloomberg Philanthropies, The Wyss Foundation, The Waterloo Foundation and Adessium Foundation. The Leonardo DiCaprio Foundation, Bloomberg Philanthropies and The Wyss Foundation are also funders of Oceana’s work in Peru.

“Leonardo DiCaprio Foundation supports efforts to restore balance to marine ecosystems across the globe,” said Justin Winters, Executive Director of the Leonardo DiCaprio Foundation. “There are far too many areas of our oceans on the brink of total collapse because of illegal and overfishing activity. In order to implement solutions that protect these vulnerable habitats and marine life, the global community needs to see what is actually happening beyond the horizon. International leaders should follow the leads of Indonesia and Peru to prioritize transparency at sea.”

“We applaud the commitments by Peru and Indonesia to release their previously private vessel tracking data and encourage other countries to follow their lead,” said Jacqueline Savitz, Vice President for the United States and Global Fishing Watch at Oceana. “Together, with forward-thinking governments like these, we can bring greater transparency to the oceans. By publishing fishing data, governments and citizens can unite to help combat illegal fishing worldwide. With more eyes on the ocean, there are fewer places for illegal fishers to hide.”

“Bloomberg Philanthropies’ Vibrant Oceans Initiative supports a groundbreaking approach to reform both local and industrial fishing simultaneously. Our approach relies on and leverages transparency and accountability on the international, national and local levels,” said Antha Williams, Head of Environmental Programs at Bloomberg Philanthropies. “These announcements from two of the world’s largest fishing nations are a significant, encouraging step. We hope that other countries will follow their lead.”

“Around the world, we are seeing how countries that implement science-based policies are restoring the productivity of their fisheries and bringing life back to the seas,” said Molly McUsic, president of the Wyss Foundation. “These commitments from Peru and Indonesia are milestones in the global movement toward healthier oceans. These commitments will improve transparency, enable better management and decision-making, and yield economic and environmental benefits.”

This story originally appeared on SeafoodNews.com, a subscription site. It is reprinted with permission.