There are new changes in the fishing moratorium policy in 2019, and there will be incentives for the protection and recovery of marine resources during the fishing moratorium.

In order to encourage fishermen to suspend fishing in Hong Kong within a certain period of time, the AFD originally laid down a "key points for the implementation of voluntary fishing moratorium". Recently, in accordance with the second provision of Article 59 of the Fisheries Law, the incentive scheme for voluntary fishing moratorium has been announced in advance. among them, the incentive fee for each sampan and raft has been increased from the original $9600 to $20,000.

The fishing moratorium in the measures stipulates that "fishing vessels have a specific fishing license and are not fishing vessels that carry and move live fish and specialize in recreational fisheries or fishing rights fisheries". Fishing vessels can apply for a cumulative total of more than 90 days of operating at sea during the fishing moratorium period, and more than 120 days of fishing moratorium in domestic ports.

It was reported earlier that some fishermen returned to Hong Kong immediately after they left Hong Kong to receive a fishing moratorium. Therefore, it is clearly stipulated in the method that the operating time for outbound operations should be up to four hours before one day of sea operation can be counted. It is hoped that genuine fishermen will come back to participate in the fishing moratorium system in line with the expectations of the Fisheries Department.

In the original operation points, it is stipulated that the reward for sampans and fishing rafts is $9600, but in the incentive scheme, it is changed to $20,000. If calculated on the basis of a 12-ton fishing boat, the reward will originally be $21600, but it will be $38000 under the new method. In addition, the new method also explicitly stipulates that the upper limit of the reward is 200000 yuan.

According to the statistics of the Fisheries Department, there are about 22,000 fishing vessels in Taiwan, and nearly 10,000 took part in the fishing moratorium last year, spending about 200 million yuan. As for whether the expenditure for this year has been assessed? The Fisheries Department said that due to the higher reward and relatively stringent vetting this year, the specific amount is still subject to the actual number of vessels applied for.

Fishermen are worried about crowding out other fisheries-related budgets. Shen Ta-Yi, deputy head of the Fisheries Administration Section of the Fisheries Department, said that it was only after the Council of Agriculture sent the budget to the Legislative Yuan for deliberation last year that the Fisheries Law was amended and accompanied by a resolution calling for incentives, so they will fight for the budget from the Executive Yuan and will not crowd out other fisheries budgets.

Zhang Huijun, chief executive of the Kuroshio Culture and Education Foundation, said that in order to achieve the restoration of marine resources, the fishing moratorium should set different fishing moratorium periods for different species and measure the rearing periods of different species. If the current voluntary fishing moratorium can take into account the recovery of marine resources, "it may still be a palliative rather than a permanent cure." it is suggested that the AFD's policy should be closer to the current situation.