5. Activities 



Under Commission management, the size of the halibut population has more than trebled— the 

 permitted annual catch, which had declined to 44 million pounds by 1931, the year before effective 

 regulatory powers were entrusted to the Commission, attained an aU-time record of 75 million pounds in 

 1962 and was worth $22 milUon to the fishermen of the two countries.^ ^ ** It is estimated that the 

 accumulated gains since 1931 have been worth more than $100 milUon to the two countries.^*' 

 Permitted annual catches are close to the sustainable maxima.^ ' * 



The principal method of regulation chosen by the Commission has been the imposition of total catch 

 limits in specific areas and the prohibition of fishing (by shortening the season) once the limits are 

 attained. However, it has also imposed size limits and restrictions on gear, particularly the prohibition of 

 trawling for halibut. 



Japan entered the eastern Bering Sea halibut fishery in 1963, after the International North Pacific 

 Fisheries Commission decided that the abstention doctrine was inapplicable to that area.^ ^ ' However, 

 since that time Canada, the United States and Japan have complied with INPFC's recommended 

 regulations for the conservation of haUbut in the area in question. In recent years, economic 

 considerations have led the Japanese to vidthdraw from the halibut fishery in a considerable part of the 

 Eastern Bering Sea. 



A large foreign trawl net fishery has also developed in the Bering Sea and the Gulf of Alaska on 

 grounds frequented by haUbut.^ ' * This trawl fishing results in some destruction of small halibut.^ ' ' 

 ' The Halibut Commission, very early in its existence, estabUshed an industry Advisory Committee 

 even though its Convention does not expressly provide for one. Experience with the Advisory 

 Committee was so beneficial that provision for such a Committee was incorporated in subsequent 

 conventions. 



B. Convention Between the United States and Canada for the Protection, Preservation and Extension of 

 the Salmon Fishery of the Fraser River System^ ^^ 



1. Objectives 



The purpose of the Convention, originally, was to restore and maintain the sockeye salmon fisheries 

 in the Fraser River system which were in danger of being depleted.^ ^' In 1956, a Protocol amended the 

 Convention to make it apply to pink salmon also.^ ^ ^ 



Statement of United States Senate Commerce Committee Staff. Treaties and other International Agreements etc., 

 supra note 53, at 248. 



1X1 



Id., at 249. This followed the removal of halibut of the eastern Bering Sea from abstention by Japan under the 

 International Convention for the High Seas Fisheries of the North Pacific Ocean. 



^'^Ibid. 



^^°This Convention was signed at Washington, D.C., May 26, 1930, entered into force July 28, 1937, 50 Stat. 1355, 

 T.S. 918, IV Trenwith 4002, 184 L.N.T.S. 305. A supplementary Agreement was reached to facilitate the ascent of 

 salmon in Hell's Gate Canyon and elsewhere in the Fraser River system. Exchange of notes at Washington, July 21 and 

 Aug. 5, 1944, entered into force Aug. 5, 1944, 59 Stat. 1614, E.A.S. 479, 121 U.N.T.S. 299. 



Convention, Preamble. 



222 



The Protocol amending the Convention to include pink salmon in the Fraser River system was signed at Ottawa, 

 Dec. 28, 1956, entered into force, July 3, 1957, 8 U.S.T. 1057, T.I.A.S. No. 3867, 290 U.N.T.S. 103. 



VIII-138 



