Sustainable fisheries, including through the 1995 Agreement for the Implementation of
the Provisions of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea of 10 December
1982 relating to the Conservation and Management of Straddling Fish Stocks
and Highly Migratory Fish Stocks, and related instruments
A/RES/73/125
specific concern, taking into account existing guidelines developed by the Food and
Agriculture Organization of the United Nations;
20. Further encourages States to enhance or develop observer programmes,
individually or through regional fisheries management organizations or arrangements,
in order to improve data collection on, inter alia, target and by-catch species, which
could also assist monitoring, control and surveillance tools, and to take int o account
standards, forms of cooperation and other existing structures for such programmes as
described in article 25 of the Agreement and article 5 of the Code;
21. Calls upon, in this regard, States, individually in line with their national
legislation or through regional fisheries management organizations or arrangements,
to take steps as appropriate to ensure the safety of observers;
22. Encourages States to implement, individually and through regional
fisheries management organizations and arrangements, accurate, complete, reliable
and effective data collection and reporting of required data on catches, including
by-catch and discards, reviewing and validating the data, and providing catch
information in support of scientific stock assessment and eco system approaches to
fisheries management;
23. Calls upon States and regional fisheries management organizations and
arrangements to collect and, where appropriate, report to the Food and Agriculture
Organization of the United Nations required catch and e ffort data, and fishery-related
information, in a complete, accurate and timely way, including for straddling fish
stocks and highly migratory fish stocks within and beyond areas under national
jurisdiction, discrete high seas fish stocks, and by-catch and discards; and, where they
do not exist, to establish processes to strengthen data collection and reporting by
members of regional fisheries management organizations and arrangements,
including through regular reviews of member compliance with such obligat ions, and,
when such obligations are not met, require the member concerned to rectify the
problem, including through the preparation of plans o f action with timelines;
24. Invites States and regional fisheries management organizations and
arrangements to cooperate with the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United
Nations in the implementation and further development of the Fisheries Resou rces
Monitoring System initiative;
25. Reaffirms paragraph 10 of its resolution 61/105 of 8 December 2006, and
calls upon States, including through regional fisheries management organizations or
arrangements, to urgently adopt and implement measures to fully implement the
International Plan of Action for the Conservation and Management of Sharks for
directed and non-directed shark fisheries, based on the best available scientific
information, through, inter alia, limits on catch or fishing effort, by requiring that
vessels flying their flag collect and regularly report data on shark catches, including
species-specific data, discards and landings, undertaking, including through
international cooperation, comprehensive stock assessments of sharks, reducing shark
by-catch and by-catch mortality and, where scientific information is uncertain or
inadequate, not increasing fishing effort in directed shark fisheries and urgently
establishing science-based management measures to ensure the long-term
conservation, management and sustainable use of shark stocks and to prevent furt her
declines of vulnerable or threatened shark stocks, and encourages the full utilization
of dead sharks caught in the context of sustainably managed fisheries;
26. Calls upon States to take immediate and concerted action to improve the
implementation of and compliance with existing regional fisheries management
organizations or arrangements and national measures that regulate shark fisheries a nd
incidental catch of sharks, in particular those measures which prohibit or restrict
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