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3 
1 (7) that it is in the national interest of the United 
D) States to utilize existing technology and capabilities of 
2B United States mining companies by providing for interim 
4 legislation which will encourage further efforts to insure 
On 
national access to available deep seabed hard minerals 
6 and to provide the means whereby the national program 
7 may be merged into an international program which 
8 evolves from negotiations on the Law of the Sea and is 
9 subsequently ratified by the United States. 
10 (b) Purroses.—The Congress declares that the pur- 
11 poses of this Act are— 
12 (1) to establish a national program to promote 
13 the orderly development of certain hard mineral re- 
14 sources of the deep seabed, pending the establishment 
15 of an international regime for that purpose; and 
16 (2) to insure the establishment of all practicable 
17 requirements necessary to protect the quality of the 
18 marine environment to the extent that that environment 
if may be affected by deep seabed hard mineral mining 
20 -development. 
2a DEFINITIONS 
22 Sc. 3. For the purposes of this Act— 
23 (a) “Secretary” means, except where its usage in- 
24 dicates otherwise, the Secretary of the Interior; 
25 (b) “deep seabed” means the seabed, and the subsoil 
