Fisheries Management (Amendment) Act, 2015 (No. 1 of 2015).

This Act amends the Fisheries Management Act 1998 principally to provide with respect to port state measures and the monitoring of activities of fishing vessels in the waters of Papua New Guinea. The Act also modifies provisions concerning the administration of the National Fisheries Authority and repeals and replaces section 25, which defines the fundamental objective of the principal Act, sets out principles and measures that the Minister and the Board or the Managing Director of the Authority shall take into account when performing functions or exercising powers under the principal Act, and concerns application of the precautionary approach (as described in the Agreement for the Implementation of the Provisions of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea of 10 December 1982 relating to the Conservation and Management of Straddling Fish Stocks and Highly Migratory Fish Stocks) and an ecosystem approach to the conservation and management of fishery resources. The definitions of "international conservation and management measures" is amended to as to include among others, the Agreement to Promote Compliance with International Conservation and Management Measures by Fishing Vessels on the High Seas in 1993 (FAO Compliance Agreement).
Amendments of the principal Act in particular concern the fulfilment of international obligations of Papua New Guinea for the implementation of international conservation measures. The Minister shall publish in the National Gazette a list of the global, regional or sub-regional organisations or arrangements to which Papua New Guinea is a party or a cooperating non contracting party and publish and the international conservation and management measures which shall have the force of law in Papua New Guinea. The Board shall refuse to grant a fishing licence if the vessel is on a list of fishing vessels maintained by a regional fisheries management organisation of vessels that are believed to have engaged in illegal, unreported, or unregulated fishing. Also, the Board shall not issue a fishing licence in respect of a vessel unless satisfied that Papua New Guinea will be able to exercise effectively its responsibilities under applicable international conservation and management measures with respect to that vessel.
This Act inserts a new Part (VIA) on Port State Measures. This Part grants powers to the Managing Director of the Authority with respect to refusal of entry of a vessel into a port of Papua New Guinea and if that vessel is believed to have been fishing in contravention of international conservation and management measures or to be without nationality, or to have operated under the flags of two or more states and to have used them according to convenience. It also grants regulation-making powers to the Head of State regarding Port State Measures and the control of illegal, unregulated or unreported fishing.
The Act also concerns vessel monitoring by automatic location communicators.