Australia assisting PNG in addressing illegal fishing

Business

THE Government is addressing illegal fishing in the country with the support of Australia, according to Fisheries and Marine Resources Minister Dr Lino Tom.
“Illegal fishing is one of the biggest problems we have in the country,” he said.
“Right now we have surveillance measures in place.
“It is a big problem because our boundaries are quite big.
“In my last trip to Australia, the Australian government actually helped us with the surveillance programme.
“Those discussions are still on going. Right now, the surveillance covers so many areas – tuna and other marine products.
“The programmes that we have in place are not up to speed at the moment. But they are effective.”
Tom said with Australia and other neighbouring countries, PNG could come up with a better surveillance programme.
“It is one of the main priority areas for the National Fisheries Authority (NFA),” he said.
He said the NFA was a regulator all along and would now want to move into the commercial space.
“We have just done our 10 year strategic road map.
“It was a regulatory authority to look at marine products not to commercial.
“So right now one of the biggest problems we have in the world is security. There is still lot of potential in terms of natural resources.
“We will make sure that we continue regulations and framework to make us compete in that international arena. Apart from the regulatory environment, we want to go into that commercial space.”