Petitions and Other Actions Regarding the Marine Mammal Protection Act Import Provisions for Vaquita and Maui Dolphins
NOAA Fisheries denied a 2019 Sea Shepherd petition to ban certain New Zealand fish imports, finding the country’s program comparable to U.S. standards (84 FR 32853).
New Zealand Māui Dolphins
NOAA Fisheries received a petition on February 6, 2019, from Sea Shepherd Legal, Sea Shepherd New Zealand Ltd., and Sea Shepherd Conservation Society. The petition requested that the relevant Secretary ban the importation of all fish and fish products caught in set nets or trawls inside the Māui dolphin's range and from the west coast of New Zealand's North Island and the Cook Strait, unless affirmatively identified as having been caught with a gear type other than set nets or trawls within that area or affirmatively identified as caught outside the Māui dolphin's range. NOAA Fisheries rejected the petition because it determined that the Government of New Zealand is implementing a regulatory program comparable in effectiveness to the United States (84 FR 32853).
On May 21, 2020, the Sea Shepherd petitioners filed a lawsuit in the Court of International Trade alleging NOAA Fisheries’ failure to ban imports from New Zealand’s North Island West Coast set net and trawl fisheries, along with the denial of their petition for rulemaking, violated the MMPA and Administrative Procedures Act. The Court granted a preliminary injunction and imposed import restrictions for the export fisheries operating on the West Coast North Island within the Māui dolphin’s range.
On January 24, 2024, and in response to the Government of New Zealand’s renewed request for comparability findings, NOAA Fisheries published notice of its issuance of comparability findings for the West Coast North Island multi-species set-net fishery and the West Coast North Island multi-species trawl fishery (89 FR 4595).
On April 1, 2024, the United States Court of International Trade (Slip Opinion 24-37) dissolved the preliminary injunction that led to the importation ban on certain seafood products harvested in the New Zealand set net and trawl fisheries. The ban has been lifted for all snapper, tarakihi, spotted dogfish, trevally, warehou, hoki, barracouta, mullet, and gurnard fish and fish products derived from set-net and trawl fisheries operating off the West Coast of North Island that operate in the range of the Māui dolphin. Certification of Admissibility requirements are no longer applicable to fish products from the Government of New Zealand under the Marine Mammal Import Provisions as of April 2, 2024.
Mexico Vaquita Porpoise
On May 18, 2017, the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), Center for Biological Diversity (CBD), and the Animal Welfare Institute (AWI) petitioned the Secretaries of Homeland Security, the Treasury, and Commerce to “ban the importation of commercial fish or products from fish” sourced using fishing activities that “result in the incidental mortality or incidental serious injury” of vaquita “in excess of United States standards.” The vaquita is a species of porpoise found in the northern part of the Gulf of California that is on the brink of extinction.
On July 26, 2018, and August 14, 2018, the Court of International Trade (CIT) (Slip-Op 18-92) required the U.S. Government to ban all fish and fish products from Mexican commercial fisheries that use gillnets within the vaquita's range, pending final adjudication of the merits. To effect this court order, NOAA Fisheries published a Federal Register notice on August 28, 2018 (83 FR 43792), giving notice of import restrictions on fish and fish products from Mexico caught with gillnets deployed in the range of the vaquita. The Mexican government reapplied and was granted a limited number of comparability findings in the Upper Gulf of California on December 6, 2018.
However, by April 8, 2019, NOAA Fisheries notified the Government of Mexico that it was revoking comparability findings for several Mexican fisheries within the range of the vaquita due to failure to implement the Plan for Improvement to the Program on the Comprehensive Care of the Upper Gulf and demonstrate that Mexico had implemented and enforced a regulatory program, comparable in effectiveness to that of the United States, to govern vaquita-safe commercial fisheries operating in the Upper Gulf of California (85 FR 13626).
Full details on Mexico’s prohibited fish and fish product exports to the United States are available on the Seafood Import Prohibitions page.