Feds sued over failure to enforce commercial fishing protections for dolphins and whales

MANHATTAN (CN)  — A coalition of three conservation and animal protection groups sued several federal officials and departments in the U.S. Court of International Trade on Thursday over the U.S. government’s failure to implement mandates on imported seafood meant to protect whales and dolphins being from harmed by commercial fishing nets and traps.

The complaint filed Thursday by the Animal Welfare Institute, Center for Biological Diversity and the Natural Resources Defense Council seeks a court order directing the U.S. government agencies to enforce the Marine Mammal Protection Act’s mandate to ban seafood imports from countries whose fisheries kill too many marine mammals.

Passed in 1972, the Marine Mammal Protection Act contains provisions regarding “bycatch”— marine wildlife that become hooked or entangled in fishing gear in both domestic and foreign fisheries  — including dolphins, porpoises, seals, sea lions, whales, and other marine mammal species.

The United States is the largest seafood importer in the world — more than $21 billion worth of seafood products are imported annually, accounting for more than 15% of the global value of all marine food products in trade. Approximately 70% to 85% of seafood consumed in the United States is imported from over 130 countries, including Canada, Indonesia, Ecuador, and Mexico.

According to the complaint, the U.S. government has failed to ban seafood imports from fisheries in Mexico, Indonesia, India, South Korea, Ecuador, the United Kingdom and South Africa, which export seafood to the United States, and did not provide required reasonable proof of the “effects on ocean mammals” of the fishing equipment used.

Various species of whales, dolphins, seals and manatees inhabit the waters in which those countries’ fisheries operate and may be at risk of being caught up by the equipment from those commercial fishing operations, the groups assert in the complaint.

Kate O’Connell, senior policy consultant for the Animal Welfare Institute’s Marine Wildlife Program, said in a statement Thursday: “It is reprehensible that more than half a century after the MMPA was enacted, Americans are still buying seafood dinners with an invisible side of whale, dolphin, porpoise, or seal.”

Under the act, foreign fisheries exporting to the United States must meet U.S. standards for bycatch; If a foreign nation does not provide “reasonable proof” to the secretary of commerce that its export fisheries comply with U.S. standards for protecting marine mammals from harm in the course of commercial fishing operations, then the law requires that the secretary of the treasury “shall” ban importation of fish and fish products from those fisheries.

Kristen Monsell, legal director at the Center for Biological Diversity, said Thursday the Marine Mammal Protection Act sets a strong international standard for preventing bycatch but the United States has been ignoring enforcement of those standards.

“It’s long past time for the federal government to stop dragging its feet and start banning seafood imports from countries harming too many marine mammals,” she wrote in a statement announcing the lawsuit.

The complaint names the Department of Commerce as co-defendant, along with the National Marine Fisheries Service, Department of the Treasury and the Department of Homeland Security.

The groups are represented by Anderson & Kreiger LLP and by in-house attorneys at the Center for Biological Diversity and Natural Resources Defense Council.

A spokesperson for the National Marine Fisheries Service declined to comment on the pending litigation.

Representatives for the other federal agencies did not immediately respond to requests for comment Thursday afternoon.

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