Binh Dinh (VNA) – All fishing ships in Binh Dinhmust obtain food safety certificates by the end of June as part of efforts to enhancethe quality of fishery products caught by the south-central province's fishing fleet, accordingto a local agricultural official.

The province has been accelerating a campaign to raise local fishermen's awareness about their responsibility to abide by the Law onFishery and persuade ship owners into signing a commitment to not encroaching foreignwaters, said Tran Van Phuc, Director of the provincial Department ofAgriculture and Rural Development.

These moves are intended to implement the EuropeanCommission (EC)’s recommendations to combat illegal, unreported andunregulated (IUU) fishing practice in order to have the EC’s “yellow card” on Vietnam’sseafood lifted, Phuc said.

In the first quarter of 2021, the provincial Fisheries Departmentgranted over 160 food safety certificates to fishing vessels witha length of 15 metres or more which have been licensed to operate offshore. So far, over 2,800 out of3,200 offshore fishing vessels in the province have received the certificate.

The department has streamlined procedures to cut the time to get the food safety certificates in accordance withcurrent regulations. Now it only takes a day for a food safety certificate to beissued, instead of three days as before, deputy director of the departmentNguyen Cong Binh said.

There are nearly 400 boats of 15 metres or more in length leftwithout a food safety certificate in Binh Dinh, most of which go fishing offshore and dock to sell their catches in ports outside the province.

The sub-department plans to send officials to neighbouringcoastal provinces to check the status of these ships and request them to obtainfood safety certificate./.