~

Applicants for commercial fishing rights under Fishing Rights Allocation Process 2021/2022 were required to file their respective administrative appeals in terms of section 80 of the Marine Living Resources Act, 18 of 1998 (“the MLRA”), read with regulation 5 of GN Regulation 1111 of 2 September 1998 (“the Fisheries Regulations”) by 29 July 2022. Regulation 5(3) of the Fisheries Regulations provides as follows: “(3) The appeal contemplated in sub-regulation (2) shall be served by the appellant on the person against whose decision the appeal is made, and that person shall submit a report on the appeal to the minister within 30 days after the appeal had been served on him or her." As such, regulation 5(3) obligates each delegated authority to produce the appeal reports within 30 days after the appeals were filed. That 30-day period expired on 30 August 2022. The obligation is peremptory.  So where are these appeal reports? They should have been made available to all applicants and a...

I recently tweeted about the possibility that the current portion of the hake long line total allowable catch allocation of the global hake TAC could be increased from its current 6.5% of global TAC to 10% of global TAC.  The proposal was first mooted in the 2021 hake trawl and hake long line fishing policies. The exact wording is the following:     "  The Department is considering implementing changes in the hake TAC sectoral  apportionment: 􏰀 Longline apportionment increased from 6.551% to 10% of the hake TAC, subject to  further investigation on possible impacts on resource dynamics and how the 3.449% of  the TAC that would be required for this will be sourced." The hake long line fishery historically fished exclusively over the "hard grounds", thus avoiding significant conflict with trawlers. This has changed over recent times as long liners have increased their fishing footprint and now also target "black" hake as well as the more lucrative ...