FISHERY BULLETIN: VOL. 70, NO. 2 



sion, the North Pacific Fur Seal Commission, the 

 International North Pacific Fisheries Commis- 

 sion, Japan-Soviet Fisheries Commission, the 

 Japan-Republic of Korea Joint Fisheries Com- 

 mission, the International Commission for the 

 Northwest Atlantic Fisheries, the Inter-Amer- 

 ican Tropical Tuna Commission, the Interna- 

 tional Commission for the Conservation of At- 

 lantic Tunas, and the International Commission 

 for the Southeast Atlantic Fisheries now in the 

 process of being established. As mentioned, 

 above, Japan is a party to a large number of 

 bilateral agreements, including some nongovern- 

 mental arrangements, with a variety of nations. 

 Consultations have also been taking place an- 

 nually between the tuna industries of the three 

 major longline fishing nations: Japan, Taiwan, 

 and South Korea. 



FORMS OF INTERNATIONAL 



ARRANGEMENTS AND MEANS 



TO IMPLEMENT THEM 



Forms of Arrangements 



The official position of the Japanese govern- 

 ment concerning high seas fishing has always 

 been for the basic freedom of fishing and, where 

 conservation measures are required, free compe- 

 tition between nations within the limitations 

 equally applicable to all. She has always sup- 

 ported a narrow territorial limit; she is still 

 not a party to the 1958 continental shelf con- 

 vention, nor the 1958 convention on fishing and 

 conservation of living resources. In practice, 

 however, she has accepted various forms of al- 

 location as means to accommodate the conflicting 

 interests of the nations concerned, although she 

 has seldom taken the initiative for making such 

 arrangements. 



The most extreme form of resource alloca- 

 tion is, of course, "abstention," which Japan ac- 

 cepted, though under unusual circumstance. 

 In most other cases, the allocation of resources 

 has been implemented through a combination 

 of catch quotas, often with a system of allocating 

 fishing grounds, and direct control on fishing ef- 

 fort. This applies to all salmon and crab fish- 

 eries (and now herring fishing) under the Ja- 

 pan-Soviet fishery agreements, the crab fishery 



under the Japan-United States agreement, the | 

 fisheries regulated under the Japan-Korea fish- 

 ery treaty, whaling in the Antarctic as well as 

 in the North Pacific, and many other cases. The 

 principle of product distribution is also practiced 

 under the fur seal treaty. In most cases, a total 

 quota is applied to fishing in a specific high seas 

 area and/or for a specific resource. To control 

 fishing effort, the types and numbers of vessels al- 

 lowed to operate in the area are restricted. The 

 total quota is usually divided between operating 

 units, such as mothership fleets or independent 

 vessels. The available fishing grounds, too, are 

 often allocated between different sectors of the 

 fishery. Such usual measures as closed seasons, 

 closed areas, size limits, gear restrictions, etc. 

 are applied. In the case of king crab, the in- 

 ternational tangle-net fishing grounds are di- 

 vided into a number of small fishing lots which 

 are allocated and regularly exchanged between 

 the Soviet and Japanese fleets (see Figures 8 

 and 9). 



Japanese responses to w^hat she considers uni- 

 lateral actions have also been rather pragmatic. 

 For example, Japan is not a party to the con- 

 tinental shelf convention, while the United States 

 and the Soviet Union are. Yet, arrangements 

 made under the Japan-United States crab agree- 

 ment and United States-Soviet crab agreement 

 are in principle the same. Japan claims a 3-mile 

 territorial limit, while the Soviet Union claims a 

 12-mile limit. But Japan has never attempted 

 to fish within 12 miles of the Soviet coast, ex- 

 cept around the southernmost islands of the Kur- 

 ile chain. The treatment of problems arising 

 from the establishment of an exclusive fishery 

 zone by the United States is not substantially 

 different between the United States-Japan fish- 

 ing agreement and the United States-Soviet fish- 

 ing agreement (see Figures 12-15) . On a global 

 basis, different arrangements have been made to 

 resolve fishery problems arising from the estab- 

 lishment of an exclusive fishery zone. The 

 United States-Japan fishing agreement men- 

 tioned above is on a give-and-take basis. Under 

 the Japan-Mexico fishing agreement, Japan man- 

 aged to continue tuna fishing in much of the 

 waters concerned. In both the Japan-Australia 

 agreement and the Japan-New Zealand agree- 



262 



