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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 March 2017
1 Report of the International Law Commission Covering the Work of Its Seventh Session, General Assembly, Official Records, 10th Sess., Supp. No. 9; reprinted in 50 A.J.I.L. 190, 205–216 (1956).
On the general background of fisheries conservation and international fisheries problems, see Allen, E. W., “International Law and Fish,” 9 The Advocate (Vancouver Bar Association) 121 (1951)Google Scholar; Chapman, W. M., “U. S. Policy on High Seas Fisheries,” 20 Dept. of State Bulletin 67 (1949)Google Scholar; J. Tomasevich, International Agreements on Conservation of Marine Resources (1943); L. L. Leonard, International Regulation of Fisheries (1944); Daggett, A. P., “The Regulation of Maritime Fisheries by Treaty,” 28 A.J.I.L. 693 (1934)Google Scholar; Ireland, G., “The North Pacific Fisheries,” 36 ibid. 400 (1942)Google Scholar; Hearings on The Fisheries Conventions, Subcommittee, U. S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, 81st Cong., 1st Sess. (July 14, 1949); Oda, S., Riches of the Sea and International Law (Tokyo, 1954)Google Scholar; Jessup, , “Exploitation des Richesses de la Mer,” Academic de Droit International, 29 Recueil des Cours 401 (1929–IV)Google Scholar.
2 Report of the International Technical Conference on the Conservation of the Living Resources of the Sea to the International Law Commission (distributed by National Fisheries Institute, Washington, D. C., as N.F.I. Flashes, No. 446); U. N. Doc. A/Conf. 10/5/Rev. 2, June 2, 1955.
The Conference Report classifies measures of fishery conservation which have been found successful in particular instances, when applied on the basis of adequate scientific research, as including: (1) regulation of the amount of fishing by fixing a maximum annual catch or indirectly limiting the catch by closed seasons and closed areas or limitations on fishing equipment; (2) protection of sizes of fish to obtain a greater average catch or more desirable quality through regulation of fishing gear, requirements that undersized fish be thrown back unharmed, or prohibition of fishing when or where small fish predominate; (3) regulations to assure continued maintenance of the stock by prohibition of fishing in spawning areas or spawning seasons, lowering the fishing rate on immature fish, improvement of spawning grounds, etc.; and (4) improvement and increase of resources by artificial propagation, transplantation of young to better environmental conditions, etc. Of course some of these measures prove of greater general value than others. Research, the making of needed regulations and modifications to meet changing conditions, enforcement, and education to obtain co-operation and support from the fishermen, appear to be the usual steps in a successful fisheries conservation program.
3 See, for example, the abortive legislative attempts in the United States, discussed in Jessup, P. C., “The Pacific Coast Fisheries,” 33 A.J.I.L. 129 (1939)Google Scholar. Cf. J. W. Bingham, Report on the International Law of Pacific Coastal Fisheries (1938), and the careful study by S. A. Riesenfeld, Protection of Coastal Fisheries under International Law (1942).
4 Cf. L. L. Leonard, International Regulation of Fisheries (1944). In the particular case of whales, now caught chiefly in the vast expanses of the Antarctic, this has been perhaps the best solution. Present regulation is under the Whaling Convention signed at Washington Dec. 2, 1946, T.I.A.S. No. 1849; 43 A.J.I.L. Supp. 174 (1949). See Leonard, op. cit. 98.
5 Provisional articles concerning the regime of the high seas, Art. 24.
6 Art. 25.
7 Art. 26.
8 Art. 27.
9 Art. 28.
10 Art. 29.
11 Proclamation 2668, Sept. 28, 1945, 10 Fed. Reg. 12304, reprinted in 40 A.J.I.L. Supp. 46 (1946). Commenting on this Proclamation, see, inter alia, Borchard, “Resources of the Continental Shelf,” 40 A.J.I.L. 53 (1946)Google Scholar; Bingham, “The Continental Shelf and the Marginal Belt,” ibid. 173; Allen, “Legal Limits of Coastal Fishery Protection,” 21 Wash. L. Rev. 1 (1946)Google Scholar; Selak, “Recent Developments in High Seas Fisheries Jurisdiction under the Presidential Proclamation of 1945,” 44 A.J.I.L. 670 (1950)Google Scholar; Bishop, “Exercise of Jurisdiction for Special Purposes in High Seas Areas beyond Outer Limit of Territorial Waters” (a paper for the Sixth Conference of the Inter-American Bar Association, May, 1949, reprinted in 99 Cong. Rec. 2586 (House, March 30, 1953)).
12 Art. 30.
13 Art. 31.
14 Art. 32.
15 Art. 33.
16 Cf. Report of the International Law Commission, 5th Bess., 1853, paragraphs 94, 99 ff., General Assembly, Official Records, 8th Sess., Supp. No. 9, reprinted in 48 A.J.I.L. Snpp. 1, 39 ff. (1954).
17 Quoted by Selak, op. cit. (footnote 11 supra) at p. 674.
18 See U. S. Dept. of State, Santiago Negotiations on Fishery Conservation Problems (1955).
18a The 1956 salmon season agreement between Japan and the Soviet Union, signed May 15, 1956, as well as their ten-year fishery agreement which is to enter into force only when progress is made in the peace treaty negotiations between the two countries, may ameliorate the situation, but the basic problem of unilateral action by the coastal state remains.
19 Comments of the United States on Chs. II and III of the Report of the International Law Commission Covering the Work of Its Seventh Session, May 2–July 8, 1955 (March 7, 1956). Cf. U. N. Doc. A/CN.4/99/Add. 1, April 5, 1956, pp. 75 ff.
20 Nothing along the line of the prior portion of this paragraph appears in the official United States Comments, cited in footnote 19.
21 Signed at Tokyo May 9, 1952. See T.I.A.S. No. 2786, reprinted in 48 A.J.I.L. Supp. 71 (1954).
22 See Final Act of Inter-American Specialized Conference on “Conservation of Natural Besources: The Continental Shelf and Marine Waters,” held at Ciudad Trujillo, March 15–26, 1956. It is indeed fortunate that the Ciudad Trujillo Conference refrained from endorsing or supporting the “Principles of Mexico on the Juridical Regime of the Sea,” hastily adopted, without adequate preliminary studies or opportunity for discussion on the merits, by the Inter-American Council of Jurists at Mexieo City on Feb. 3, 1956, by a vote of 15 to 1 (United States), with Bolivia, Colombia, Cuba, Dominican Republic, and Nicaragua abstaining. See 34 Dept. of State Bulletin 296–299 (1956). In addition to declaring that “each state is competent to establish its territorial waters within reasonable limits, taking into account geographical, geological, and biological factors, as well as the economic needs of the population, and its security and defense,” without other limitation by international law, the principles of Mexico asserted a very unrestrained right of coastal states “of exclusive exploitation of species closely related to the coast, the life of the country, or the needs of the coastal population, as in the case of species that develop in territorial waters and subsequently migrate to the high seas, or when the existence of certain species has an important relation with an industry or activity essential to the coastal country, or when the latter is carrying out important works that will result in the conservation or increase of the species.” Cf. Consejo Interamerieano de Juriseonsultos, Actas y Documentos de la Tercera Reunión sobre Mar Territorial y Cuestiones Afines (Pan American Union, 1956).
