Background

The Department of Commerce’s National Marine Fisheries Service has announced that new import restrictions will be imposed on fish and fish products from specified fisheries in Mexico as of April 3.

The Marine Mammal Protection Act and NMFS regulations ban the importation of commercial fish or products from fish that have been caught with commercial fishing technology that results in the incidental kill or serious injury of ocean mammals in excess of U.S. standards. NMFS has now determined to revoke its comparability findings for the following fisheries in the Upper Gulf of California in Mexico because Mexico failed to implement the regulatory plan that formed the basis for those findings.

- shrimp trawl fishery for both small and large vessels

- shrimp suripera fishery

- sierra purse seine fishery

- sierra hook and line fishery

- chano trawl fishery, for small vessels

- curvina purse seine fishery

- sardine/curvina purse seine fishery for both small and large vessels

As a result, the U.S. is banning the importation from Mexico of all shrimp, curvina, sierra, chano, anchovy, herrings, sardines, mackerels, croaker, and pilchard fish and fish products that are imported under specified HTSUS numbers (see notice for details) and either (a) caught with gillnets deployed in the range of the vaquita, an endangered porpoise, or (b) harvested in the fisheries listed above.

In addition, fish and fish products of the same or similar fish or fish products that are not within the scope of these import restrictions but are imported under the same published HTSUS numbers must be accompanied by a certification of admissibility.

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