NOAA Fisheries has released its final rule establishing the Seafood Import Monitoring Program. The Program establishes for imports of certain seafood products, the reporting and recordkeeping requirements needed to prevent illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU)-caught and/or misrepresented seafood from entering U.S. commerce, thereby providing additional protections for our national economy, global food security and the sustainabiltiy of our shared ocean resources.
This is the first-phase of a risk-based traceability program–requiring the importer of record to provide and report key data–from the point of harvest to the point of entry into U.S. commerce–on an initial list of imported fish and fish products identified as particularly vulnerable to IUU fishing and/or misrepresentation. January 1, 2018 is the mandatory compliance date for most priority species listed in the rule. Due to gaps in availability of information regarding U.S. farmed shrimp and abalone, implementation for these species will be effective at a later date. The Program will eventually expand to include all species.
NOAA has scheduled two initial public webinars next–
Thursday, December 15, and Friday, December 16–to provide an overview and walk folks through the key details of the new program and this first phase. However, NOAA will be conducting a robust outreach effort throughout this next year and will be organizing additional webinars.
All details and related materials are posted to the webportal.
In closing, this final rule reflects and responds to the numerous public comments received on the proposed rule and underscores our efforts to establish an effective program that minimizes the burden of compliance while providing the necessary information need to achieve the objectives.