Wildlife Advocacy Groups Settle Case Seeking Import Ban on International Fisheries With NMFS
The National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) said comparability findings are coming by Sept. 1, 2025, for "all harvesting nations that did not submit an application for a comparability finding" and all harvesting nations the NMFS has already preliminarily said will be denied a comparability finding. The announcement came as part of a settlement of a lawsuit from three wildlife advocacy groups against the NMFS's failure to ban fish or fish products exported from fisheries that don't meet U.S. bycatch standards under the Marine Mammal Protection Act (Natural Resources Defense Council v. Gina Raimondo, CIT # 24-00148).
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Settling the lawsuit, NMFS laid out a four-phase schedule through which it will implement the MMPA. Under the first phase, NMFS sent notifications to all subject harvesting nations on Dec. 16, 2024, to allow them to submit "reliable information to refute the preliminary denial" of comparability findings. Under the second phase, which was completed Jan. 15, NMFS issued notifications to all harvesting nations that NMFS preliminarily denied comparability findings for one or more of their fisheries.
Phase three will see NMFS issue "final comparability findings for all harvesting nations" by Sept. 1, 2025. Under the settlement agreement, NMFS will confirm its performance of phases two and three to the wildlife groups within five business days of performance "by providing an attestation of compliance."
The final phase will see NMFS "identify and prohibit the importation of fish and fish products into the United States from all harvesting nations or fisheries for which NMFS has denied a comparability finding."
The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), the Center for Biological Diversity and the Animal Welfare Institute in their complaint alleged that fisheries in nine nations -- Canada, Ecuador, France, India, Indonesia, Mexico, South Africa, the U.K. and South Korea -- failed to meet U.S. standards. As a result, the companies said the Commerce, Treasury and Homeland Security departments and the NMFS haven't undertaken their mandated duty in that they failed to ban fish from these fisheries (see 2408080028).
Celebrating the settlement, NRDC senior attorney Zak Smith said the deal "will ensure some relief for threatened marine mammals suffering from bycatch, level the playing field for fishermen working hard to protect marine mammals, and give consumers more confidence that the seafood they consume does not needlessly kill the whales and dolphins they love."
Under the settlement, the government agreed to pay the wildlife groups $75,000 in legal fees.