46 



of Korea, and Taiwan were fishing an estimated 30,000 miles of net per night in 

 the North Pacific in the pursuit of squid, tuna, and salmon. These vessels were op- 

 erating outside any international fisheries management regime, and were believed 

 to be taking substantial numbers of North American salmon and steel head illegally, 

 as well as having significant impacts on marine mammals, sea birds, sea turtles, 

 numerous fish species, and other marine life. In addition, fleets of large trawlers 

 from Japan, Korea, Poland, and the Peoples Republic of China were fishing in the 

 Central Bering Sea donut hole, taking roughly 1.4 million metric tons of pollock in 

 a free-for-all, unregulated fishery. This level of harvest exceeded the pollock harvest 

 inside the U.S. zone, and led to the collapse of the Aleutian Basin pollock stock in 

 1991 just 2 years later. 



In each of these instances, important U.S. fish stocks were at risk. In each in- 

 stance, management regimes were either non-existent or, in the case of the INPFC 

 fishery, so inefi'ective, that U.S. interests could not be protected. In both the driflnet 

 and donut hole fisheries, enforcement was totally absent resulting in numerous 

 major illegal fishing activities taking place. 



Today, just 5 years later, the situation is somewhat different, Mr. Chairman. 

 Enormous progress has been made over the past few years. Progress that has come 

 about in large part due to leadership from this Committee. 



Today, because of the leadership of the United States, there is a global ban on 

 the use of large scale pelagic driflnets. The unacceptable impacts of driftnets on 

 tuna and other fish stocks has ceased, the illegal interceptions of our salmon and 

 steelhead are gone, and the incidental takings of thousands of marine mammals and 

 hundreds of thousands of sea birds have ended, and the waste of millions of pounds 

 of non-target fish has stopped. 



The Japanese directed high seas salmon fishery, and the INPFC which authorized 

 it, have been terminated. The INPFC has been replaced with the North Pacific 

 Anadromous Fish Commission (NPAFC), which prohibits fishing for salmon and 

 other anadromous fish outside the 200 mile zones of the North Pacific. The conven- 

 i-icn establishing the NPAFC has specific conservation and management measures 

 for anadromous stocks and ecologically related species, specific obligations and du- 

 ties for cooperation and coordination of scientific research, and strong enforcement 

 provisions. The parties to the NPAFC are Russia, Japan, Canada, and the U.S. The 

 Convention went into eflect last year. 



And, just this year, another new convention was completed. The "Convention on 

 the Conservation and Management of the Pollock Resources in the Central Bering 

 Sea" was initialed in February of this year in Washington D.C. by the United 

 States, Russia, Japan, Poland, the Peoples Republic of China, and the Republic of 

 Korea. This convention places a moratorium on fishing in the Central Bering Sea 

 donut hole, and sets up a management regime to govern fishing once the stocks re- 

 cover. 



In just 5 short years, Mr. Chairman, the international fisheries management re- 

 gime for the North Pacific has undergone a major restructuring. U.S. stocks are bet- 

 ter protected. International cooperation on scientific research and enforcement has 

 been expanded and improved. Cooperation among the major coastal states has been 

 strengthened. How did these developments come about? They came about because 

 of the ability and willingness of the United States to use trade policy, national and 

 international law, and strong diplomacy around the world to persuade all of the par- 

 ties concerned that these were serious matters that had to be resolved. 



While these developments are certainly good news, other pending actions cause 

 us to be concerned that the ability of the United States to address marine conserva- 

 tion issues in the future may be seriously compromised. There are three areas of 

 particular concern: 



MANAGEMENT OF ^RADDLING STOCKS 



The first issue has to do with the conservation and management of straddling 

 stocks of fish. The United States has announced its intention to become a signatory 

 to the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) in the near future. One 

 of the major unresolved fisheries issues in UNCLOS is the conservation and man- 

 agement of straddling stocks. The State of Alaska is intimately familiar with the 

 straddling stock issue, given that we have been involved in one of the world's pio- 

 neer efforts to crafl a straddling stocks convention to manage the Central Bering 

 Sea donut hole fishery for Aleutian Basin pollock. 



The U.N. Conference on Straddling Fish Stocks and Highly Migratory Fish Stocks 

 is currently attempting to address the straddling stocks issue by setting broad inter- 

 national policies for governing the conservation and management of such stocks. 



