On Friday, the Federal Register published Notice of the National Ocean Council (NOC) Committee’s finalized principles for determining seafood species at risk of Illegal, Unreported, and Unregulated (IUU) Fishing and seafood fraud, as well as a list of “at-risk” species developed using these principles.
Both the list of principles and the list of species are intended to inform the development of a traceability program to be implemented regarding seafood sold in the U.S. market. As explained in the Notice, this traceability program is to be developed in the future “through notice-and-comment rulemaking, pursuant to the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act . . . .” This rulemaking process “will address data requirements, the design of the program, and the species to which the first phase of the program will be applied.”
The list of species published Friday identifies those seafood products that are of special concern. According to the Notice, “the species list has been developed to identify species for which the current risks of IUU fishing or seafood fraud warrant prioritization for the first phase of the traceability program.”
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