Quyết định 339/QD-TTg

DECISION

APPROVING THE STRATEGY FOR DEVELOPMENT OF VIETNAM’S FISHERIES BY 2030 WITH VISION TOWARDS 2045

THE PRIME MINISTER

Pursuant to the Law on Government Organization dated June 19, 2015; the Law on Amending and Supplementing certain Articles of the Law on Government Organization and the Law on Local Government Organization dated November 22, 2019;

Pursuant to the Law on Fisheries dated November 21, 2017;

At the request of the Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development,

HEREBY DECIDES

Article 1. Approving the Strategy for Development of Vietnam’s Fisheries by 2030 with vision towards 2045, including the followings:

I. DEVELOPMENTAL VIEWPOINTS

1. Building the fishery industry into the economy with the large scale and high commodity rate, the prestigious brand name, the in-depth participation in the global supply chain, and the highly competitive and sustainable capability. Ensuring the deep and wide international integration, and the responsible development towards the circular economy, improving productivity, quality, added value and efficiency.

2. Boosting the industrialization and modernization of the fishery industry so that it becomes a market-oriented, environment-friendly industry, helps protect, revive and develop fishery resources, and conserve biodiversity; helps adapt to climate change; helps ensure epidemic safety, biological safety and social security. Developing fisheries in collaboration with improving people's material and spiritual life, building new rural areas; combining the economic development with construction of a strong defense and security posture at sea, contributing to firmly defending the national sovereignty over the islands of our Fatherland.

3. Attracting resources and economic sectors to invest in developing fisheries effectively, including the force of enterprises playing a core role. Concentrating on investment in developing the synchronous infrastructure and technical facilities; training, educating, developing and using effectively human resources; strengthening researches, technology transfers and applications with priority given to the application of high technologies and digital transformation; reforming regulatory systems and improving state management and production re-organization capacity.

II. GOALS TO BE ACHIEVED BY 2030 WITH VISION TOWARDS 2045

1. General goals to be achieved by 2030:

Developing the fishery industry into an important national economic sector, producing a large output of goods associated with industrialization - modernization, sustainable development and proactive adaptation to climate change; having reasonable production structures and models, ensuring high productivity, quality and efficiency; having a prestigious brand name, competitiveness and international integration; constantly improving the people's material and spiritual life, ensuring social security; contributing to ensuring national defense and security, maintaining the independence and sovereignty over our Fatherland’s islands.

2. Several main goals to be obtained by 2030

a) Rate of growth in the value of fishery products is expected to reach 3.0% - 4.0 %/year.

b) The total output of domestic fishery products is expected to reach 9.8 million tonnes; including, aquaculture production is expected to reach 7.0 million tonnes, and the fishing output is expected to reach 2.8 million tonnes.

c) The fishery export turnover will reach USD 14 – 16 billion.

d) Creating jobs for over 3.5 million workers with per capita income of fishery workers equivalent to the average income of workers nationwide. Building coastal fishing villages and islands into civilized residential communities with the cultural and spiritual life imbued with their own identity. This must be associated with building new rural areas.

3. Vision towards 2045

Fishery will be developing into a modern, sustainable economic and commercial sector with an advanced level of management, science and technology; a deep seafood processing center and will be ranked as one of three leading seafood producing and exporting countries in the world; will hold an important position in the structure of the agricultural and marine economy, contributing to ensuring nutrition and food security; ensuring social security, green, clean, beautiful and civilized fishing villages to come into existence; fishery workers will have income equal to the national average income; contributing to ensuring national defense and security, maintaining the independence and sovereignty over our Fatherland’s islands.

III. DEVELOPMENTAL ORIENTATION 

1. Developmental orientation by subsectors

a) Protection and development of fishery resources

- Focusing on investigation and assessment of fishery resources and habitats of aquatic species and deep sea marine resources as a basis for protection, regeneration and sustainable exploitation of fishery resources.

- Completing the database system of fishery resources in the direction of digital transformation, and serving as a basis for forecasting fishing grounds and fishery resources.

- Establishing, expanding and improving the operational efficiency of marine protected areas. Paying attention to protecting breeding areas, immature fish farming areas and migration routes of aquatic species. Developing and conserving sea, ecotourism and new rural areas.

- Organizing the management and protection of concentrated fish farming areas, immature fish farming areas and migration routes of aquatic species.

- Keeping original varieties, conserving and efficiently exploiting genetic resources; conducting researches on breed reproduction, giving priority to the supplementary stocking of aquatic species of economic and scientific value; native aquatic species; endemic aquatic species into natural waters.

- Prioritizing researches on planting and transplanting corals to ensure the restoration of coral reef ecosystems.

- Forming artificial habitats for endangered, precious and rare aquatic species.

- Protecting habitats of aquatic species, additionally reviving fishery resources in inland natural water bodies, reservoirs, lagoons in coastal areas and marine areas. Emphasizing and regularly performing activities of supplementary stocking, regeneration and development of fishery resources nationwide so that these activities involve various economic sectors.

- Strengthening the implementation of co-management in the protection of fishery resources, assigning management rights to community-based organizations over the protection of fishery resources in coastal areas and inland waters.

- Deploying Fishery Resources Protection and Development Foundation, mobilizing financial resources for the protection, regeneration and development of fishery resources.

b) Fishery production

- Promoting the efficient and sustainable exploitation of marine products on the basis of gradually reducing fishing force to be suited for reserves of fishery resources.

- Reorganizing activities of fishing in open, inshore or inland waters in a reasonable manner, linking the livelihood development of fishermen with the development of aquaculture, ecotourism, and recreational fishing industries.

- Complying with responsible fisheries codes of conduct, combating illegal, uninformed and violating fishing activities.

- Building the logical structure of the fishery production industry, the full-time and part-time labor structure according with natural conditions, fishery resources, and socio-economic characteristics of each region. Allocating appropriate fishing quotas.

- Minimizing and striving to abort destructive fishing practices, converting activities extremely invading fishery resources or consuming a lot of fuel into the ones friendly to the environment and fishery resources.

- Attracting businesses to make their investments for fishery development purposes; forming a number of large enterprises and corporations to cooperate in open-ocean fishery production. Consolidating and refreshing groups, teams and cooperatives; organizing fishery production according to the value chain.

- Applying advanced scientific and technological achievements, mechanizing and modernizing fishing ships; reducing post-harvest losses by 2030 to below 10%; ensuring food safety for fishing ships; ensuring that living and working conditions of crew members are in line with the trend of international integration.

- Modernizing fisheries management activities at sea to proactively alert and promptly respond to incidents, risks and natural disasters at sea. Ensuring safety for people and fishing vessels at sea, effectively participating in support for search and rescue activities, contributing to ensuring national defense and security, firmly maintaining independence and sovereignty over our Fatherland’s islands.

c) Aquaculture

- Continuing to develop effective farming of key species and aquatic species of certain economic value, associated with ecological environment protection, proactively adapting to climate change. Exploiting the potentials of water surfaces, developing aquaculture on reservoirs, areas where saline intrusion newly occurs due to climate change and cannot be continuously used for agricultural production purposes.

- Actively developing high-quality aquatic breed production systems. Prioritizing the development of breeds of key species of high economic value and potential new species.

- Developing marine aquaculture into a commodity production sector, and encouraging the development of industrial-scale aquaculture in open sea zones; creating a large volume of products for export processing and domestic consumption purposes.

- Developing farming of microalgae and seaweeds to serve food needs and supply raw materials for other economic sectors (e.g. cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, ...). Cultivating ornamental and recreational aquatic creatures and those used as handicrafts and pharmaceuticals to meet the needs of domestic and foreign consumer markets.

- Developing the farming of traditional fish species, indigenous fish, cold-water fish, etc. in rural and mountainous areas having suitable ecological conditions in order to actively supply food, create jobs and increase income for farmer’s families, mountainous people, and contributing to poverty alleviation.

- Encouraging the development of aquaculture models that apply new and advanced technologies, reduce production costs, are environmentally friendly, and adapt to climate change; organic and ecological farming models, applying certification standards for good aquaculture practices (GAP) for value enhancement and sustainable development.

- Improving the aquaculture production and management capacity by pursuing modernity, applying information technology and digital technology to management and production of aquatic breeds and materials, prevention and control of diseases, and aquaculture.

d) Seafood processing and trading

- Developing a large-scale commodity seafood processing industry playing its key roles in leading and promoting the development of seafood production chains in the direction of increasing added value and developing sustainably; rapidly turning Vietnam into a global seafood processing center.

- Founding enterprises and large groups of world-class standard that produce highly competitive and branded products in the international market. Producing and processing fishery products based on market demands and signals.

- Applying scientific and technological advances, changing the structure of products in the direction of increasing the proportion of value-added processed products serving food and non-food industries; renovating machines, equipment and technologies; increasing productivity and quality; ensuring food safety, conformance to rules of origin, environmental safety and social security; improving economic efficiency and competitiveness; participating deeply in the global supply chain.

- Proactively achieving international integration, attracting investment, resources and expanding export markets; improving quality and diversifying products processed for the domestic market.

- Prioritizing the use of raw materials obtained from domestic production and aquaculture activities, expanding the market for legal raw materials with the stable output and quality in order to maximize Vietnam's processing capacity.

- Maintaining and developing the market share of Vietnamese seafood in the key markets (e.g. the United States, the European Union, China, Japan, ...), constantly expanding its market share in potential markets (e.g. Korea, Middle East, Eastern Europe, South America, Southeast Asia, etc.). Consolidating and developing the domestic seafood processing industry, expanding the domestic market on the basis of diversifying products to match Vietnamese consumers' tastes.

- Organizing the circular fishery production according to the product value chain. Implementing the traceability and branding of seafood products, especially those have high competitive advantages in Vietnam. Building the domestic and foreign distribution channel system for fishery products.

dd) Fishing logistics establishments

- Investing and developing synchronous infrastructure and logistics services serving the production, farming and processing of fishery products. Investing in the construction of fishing ports, anchorage zones for storm sheltering purposes for fishing ships on islands and remote waters. Building stations providing services, logistics, preliminary processing, storage and transshipment of products on islands. Continuing to invest in 5 major fishing centers in Hai Phong, Da Nang, Khanh Hoa, Ba Ria - Vung Tau, Kien Giang to link them with key fishing grounds and Can Tho fisheries development center linked with the Mekong River Delta aquaculture region.

- Encouraging the development of logistics services needed for fishing and aquaculture activities at sea, wholesale markets, seafood auction markets, processing facilities, bonded cold storage at seaports and border checkpoints.

- Encouraging investment in the development of supporting industries necessary the fishery production, aquaculture and processing of fishery products. Consolidating and developing the mechanical engineering industry, building and repairing fishing ships with priority given to the use of new materials in the building of fishing ships. Strengthening research and application of advanced technologies to the production of ship hulls, ship engines and fishing gears; communication equipment, tools and equipment for aquaculture, processing and fishery services.

- Applying information technology, digital technology, automation and digital transformation to improve efficiency in fishery management, production, sales and services.

2. Developmental orientation by regions

General orientation for the development of fisheries by regions:

- Focusing resources on consolidating, expanding, developing and establishing new marine conservation zones and aquatic resource protection zones in accordance with natural and socio-economic conditions of each region, especially aquatic resource protection zones located at coastal areas, mangroves, lagoons, upstream and river basins.

- Strengthening the implementation of co-management in the protection of fishery resources, assigning managerial authority to community-based organizations over the protection of fishery resources in coastal areas and inland waters.

- Building fishing villages (e.g. those located at suburban zones, estuaries, dam valleys, beaches, islands, etc.) in association with tourism and other trades to ensure livelihood for fishing communities.

- Transforming the fishing industry structure to suit natural conditions and aquatic resources; dramatically reducing occupations that harm aquatic resources.

- Strengthening the system of organizations in charge of state management fisheries and fishery extension activities in localities.

Specific orientation for the development of fisheries by specific regions:

a) Red River Delta region

- Continuing to renovate the structure of fishery production, effectively developing the offshore fishing trade in association with the fishing grounds of Tonkin Gulf and the areas adjacent to the fishing grounds of Hoang Sa (Paracel) islands. Rationalizing fishing trades in open or inshore areas, in combination with developing marine ecotourism and marine aquaculture. Investing in building and completing Hai Phong’s big fishing center synchronously in the system of fishing ports, storm shelters for fishing ships operating in the key grounds of Tonkin Gulf, building and repairing fishing ships.

- Encouraging the development of intensive aquaculture models that apply new, advanced, high-yield technologies, incur reduced production costs, are environmentally friendly, and adapt to climate change.

- Development of aquaculture:  Developing the cultivation of marine fish, mollusks and seaweeds on the basis of aquaculture arrangement and management in coastal, near-shore areas to meet requirements concerning the carrying capacity of the environment, disease safety, environmental protection, and encouragement of aquaculture development at waters near the islands. Maintaining and developing diversified in-field traditional fish farming.

- Developing aquaculture for ornamental and recreational purposes in cities, urban areas and tourist attractions. Encouraging the development of aquaculture in association with educational, tourism and sightseeing activities.

- Reviewing and changing the product structures of seafood processing establishments to suit conditions of raw material areas with specialty aquatic species, investing in branding, geographical indications, and commercial promotion of specialty fishery products; building logistics centers, bonded cold warehouses linked with seaports, international markets, especially the Chinese market.

b) North Central Coast and Central Coast

- Effectively developing marine fishing activities in offshore waters, especially tuna fishing, finning and capture fishery. Reorganizing fishing in open and inshore waters, changing the structure of fishing trades and labor to suit natural conditions and aquatic resources; changing occupations from fishing to development of marine aquaculture and marine ecotourism services.

- Organizing the combined models involving civilians, military forces and enterprises in marine fishery production and aquaculture, especially in the zones around Truong Sa (Spratly) islands. Effectively organizing models of offshore fishing logistics services, fishing logistics ships at sea, and fishing logistic service stations on islands.

- Development of aquaculture:  Developing the cultivation of marine fish, lobsters, mollusks, marine microalgae, seaweeds and moss on the basis of aquaculture arrangement and management in inshore, near-shore areas to meet requirements concerning the carrying capacity of the environment, disease safety, environmental protection; encouraging the development of aquaculture models at waters near the offshore islands to suit natural characteristics of sea areas of the Central Coast and adapt to climate change conditions.

- Developing cultivation of fish for ornamental and recreational purposes in cities, urban areas and tourist attractions. Encouraging the development of aquaculture in association with educational, tourism and sightseeing activities.

- Developing aquaculture on reservoirs in midland and mountainous areas to serve the purposes of providing food for domestic consumption, creating jobs, increasing income, contributing to poverty reduction for poor households and ethnic minorities.

- Encouraging seafood processing establishments to invest in advanced science and technology to improve the efficiency of the value chain of tuna, lobster, mollusc products, etc., to increase the added value of export products. Investing in restoring and enhancing the brand reputation of traditional domestic products such as fish sauce, dried squid, and sour shrimp, etc. Building and developing tuna brands in Vietnam.

- Investing in upgrading and developing Da Nang’s big fishing center in association with the East Sea and fishing grounds of Hoang Sa (Paracel) islands. Developing Khanh Hoa’s large fishing center associated with fishing grounds in the South Central Coast and Truong Sa (Spratly) islands, shipbuilding and repair services. Consolidating concentrated aquatic breed production centers in the provinces of the South Central Coast and investing in developing them into national ones for the production of shrimp and other marine breeds nationwide.

c) Southeast region

- Increasing the efficiency of fishing in the open waters, changing the structure of the fishing trade to suit natural conditions and aquatic resources. Rationally organizing fishery production trades in open and inshore waters and maintaining the inland fishery production.

- Developing inshore and island aquaculture; the effective aquaculture on rivers and large reservoirs to increase income for people and provide food for the domestic market. Developing the farming of ornamental aquatic creatures in the direction of producing goods for tourism and export purposes.

- Developing deep processing establishments, advanced and modern technologies, producing instant food for tourism, markets in Ho Chi Minh City, Hanoi and major cities, and for export. Investing in Ba Ria - Vung Tau’s big fishing center in association with Southeastern fishing grounds in line with fishing ports, storm shelters for fishing ships, infrastructure, logistics services for fishing activities in Vung Tau , Con Dao, logistics centers, bonded warehouses in the region, and so on.

d) Mekong Delta region

- Changing to the appropriate fishing structure; reducing the number of fishing vessels in the southwest sea, especially tugboats. Investing in science and technology, upgrading the fleet of fishing ships, developing the offshore fishery production effectively. Reducing the number of fishing vessels operating in open and inshore waters, shifting a part of the labor force involved in fishery production in open or inshore waters to the labor force serving in offshore waters, marine aquaculture services, marine ecotourism and other economic sectors.

- Investing in Kien Giang’s big fishing center in association with southwestern fishing grounds, synchronizing them with the system of fishing ports, storm shelters for fishing ships, fisheries infrastructure in the region, especially on islands. Investing in Can Tho’s aquatic product development center in association with aquaculture regions in the Mekong Delta.

- Rationally organizing inland fishery production in association with environmental protection; protection, regeneration and development of aquatic resources.

- Expanding aquaculture areas in regions affected by saline intrusion. Applying advanced science and technology, developing aquaculture in all of three salt, brackish and fresh water areas. Developing brackish water shrimps and pangasius farming by applying industrial models, modern technologies, super-intensive farming with high productivity and large output. At the same time, developing organic and ecological farming in mangrove forests, rice fields, ponds and lakes. Developing the farming of marine specialties.

- Formulating and organizing the implementation of incentive policies granted to large-scale seafood processing and export enterprises and groups, developing a chain of agents distributing and selling seafood products on domestic and international markets.

- Effectively organizing the fishery production in the value chain between seafood processing enterprises, input material suppliers, credit institutions and fish farmers or fishermen. Branding key seafood products: Giant tiger prawns, whiteleg shrimps, pangasius fish, etc.

dd) Mountainous and midland regions of the North and Central Highlands

- Developing aquaculture on reservoirs, in-field water bodies, rearing traditional aquatic species and aquatic specialties of economic value to create livelihood, contribute to poverty reduction and provide food for the people. Taking advantage of natural conditions to develop cold water seafood for domestic and export markets. Implementing the co-management in the protection of aquatic resources living in water bodies. Restoring ecosystems, indigenous and endemic aquatic species.

- Mobilizing social resources to invest in upgrading and perfecting aquatic breed production establishments, providing high-quality aquatic breeds on the spot, lowering costs and effectively supporting people in developing the family economy.

- Building and developing networks for consumption of processed fishery products and fresh seafood in localities, especially in remote, isolated and border areas. Investing in cold storage systems for commercial services at the centers of provinces and border gates to store products for commercial and export purposes.

IV. SIGNIFICANT SOLUTIONS

1. Developing synchronous fisheries infrastructure

- Developing and completing the national sector planning, fisheries programs, projects and proposals.

- Concentrate resources on investing in fisheries infrastructure to ensure synchronous development and conformity to the planning, programs and projects in the fisheries sector, meeting criteria and regulations of the Fisheries Law, including: Large fishing centers, fishing ports, storm shelters for fishing ships; concentrated aquaculture zones, marine aquaculture zones, concentrated aquatic breeding areas, marine breeding areas; national and regional aquatic breed centers; aquaculture testing, experimenting and inspection activities; marine protected areas; research, investigation, protection and development of aquatic resources; establishments building and repairing fishing ships, producing fishing gears; logistics center; systems for monitoring and tracking activities of fishing ships at sea; national fisheries information system and database; aquacultural environment and disease monitoring and warning systems.

2. Scientific and technological development and application

Science and technology is a key, important solution to increasing productivity, reducing costs, increasing the value of fishing, aquaculture and fish processing activities. Focusing on solving the following issues:

- Boosting the private sector investments in activities of researching, transferring and applying scientific and technological advances; formulating and organizing the implementation of incentive policies for enterprise’s participation in research and transfer of technologies into production activities.

- Researching and applying scientific and technological advances in preserving aquatic genes and breeding aquatic species in order to conserve and develop indigenous, endemic, endangered aquatic species of high scientific and economic value; investigating and evaluating aquatic resources, habitats of aquatic species, and forming artificial habitats for aquatic species.

- Researching and applying information technology, digital technology in the management and protection of aquatic resources, forecast of fishing grounds, fishery resources and monitoring of fishing vessel activities; fishery production technology; aquaculture management; mechanization and automation of the fishery production; post-harvest product preservation; building and completing a national database on fisheries. Utilizing the e-commerce exchanges of seafood products.

- Researching, improving and applying fuel and energy-efficient technologies in fisheries production activities.

- Domesticating and selecting main species (e.g. tiger shrimp, white leg shrimp, pangasius,...) to meet high-quality, disease-free breed requirements for aquaculture development. Researching, transferring and applying breeding technologies for some species that are mainly those of the wild origin (e.g. lobster, mollusk, marine fish,...).

- Researching, transferring and applying aquacultural technologies ensuring high productivity, conformance to quality standards, circularity, less consumption of water and energy, production cost reduction, environmental protection, especially technological systems for intensive farming, super intensive farming, organic and ecological farming.

- Boosting up the research and manufacture of drugs and biologicals used for disease control and constraint purposes; applying information technology and artificial intelligence to disease diagnosis, prevention and treatment activities; reducing and replacing the use of chemicals and antibiotics in aquaculture.

- Researching, transferring and applying technologies to produce pharmaceuticals, cosmetics, functional foods from algae, seaweeds and other aquatic species.

- Researching and applying technologies for recycling and reusing by-products from seafood production activities.

3. Human resource training and development

- Training scientific and technical staff, especially those specialized in fisheries (e.g. digital technology, biotechnology in fisheries management, exploitation of aquatic resources, aquaculture, genetics, breed selection, disease, nutrition, environment, post-harvest primary processing and preservation technology,...).

- Training, educating, retraining and developing human resources with deep expertise and high skills, including: Human resources for the protection and development of aquatic resources, fishery production, aquaculture and fish processing.

- Training fisheries management staff to meet international integration requirements, to be capable of applying high technologies to management and administration. Training in corporate governance, commerce and market development for seafood businesses.

- Attracting international resources in cooperation, training and development of high-quality human resources for the fisheries sector.

- Building links and connections between training institutions, research institutes and enterprises in training and developing human resources to meet the needs of the labor market.

- Investing in increasing the capacity of Fisheries Research Institute; Aquaculture Research Institutes I, II, III; Institute of Fisheries Economics and Planning; Department of Fisheries - Vietnam Academy of Agriculture; Institute of Fisheries Science and Technology - Nha Trang University; Faculty of Fisheries - Can Tho University; Colleges of Economics, Technology and Fisheries,... so that they become institutions for scientific, technological research, training and development of high-quality fisheries human resources.

4. Regulatory mechanism and policy framework

Researching and completely formulating several regulatory policies as follows:

a) Land and water surface policies

Policies on allocation, lease, appropriation and requisition of land, water surfaces and allocated marine waters for aquaculture in accordance with laws.

b) Financial and credit policies

- State budget expenditures prioritized for investment and support in:

+ Developing synchronous fisheries infrastructure;

+ Reducing the intensity of fishing to protect, revive and develop aquatic resources, change trades from fishing to others; supporting fishermen during the time when fishing is banned; participating in search and rescue at sea, participating in protecting national defense and security, sovereignty over waters and islands;

+ Training and improving the managerial capacity and developing human resources in the fisheries sector;

+ Researching and applying high technologies to improve the product quality, value-added products, reducing post-harvest losses, reducing production costs, protecting the environment, and adapting to climate change.

+ Providing support for the implementation of co-management in aquatic resource protection for community organizations participating in the management, protection and development of aquatic resources;

+ Supporting and encouraging the development of marine aquaculture.

- Effectively implementing tax and fee incentives for activities in all of the fisheries subsectors in order to facilitate the development of fisheries into the important economic sector of our country.

- Credit for developmental investment: Organizations and individuals engaged in fisheries activities may take out the State's development investment loans in accordance with current laws.

- Completing and effectively implementing insurance policies and the State budget’s funding for purchase of insurance for fishing ships and crew members; aquacultural workers and facilities at sea.

c) Trade policies

- Importing seafood raw materials and imposing technical barriers in accordance with international regulations to protect the domestic fishery production industry.

- Reorganizing the system of seafood consumption associated with chains, ensuring traceability, origin and conformance to international integration requirements.

- Encouraging investment in building auction centers, e-commerce exchanges to introduce and promote fishery products.

5. Markets and international integration

a) Markets and trade promotions

- Strengthening trade promotion activities, developing markets in countries and regions that are signatories to Free Trade Agreements; developing and expanding key and potential markets.

- Improving capacity to exchange and access information about markets and trading of aquatic products for businesses, administrators and stakeholders. Adopting proactive policies to create resources for trade associations to seek and develop markets, promote trading and consumption of aquatic products.

- Developing and expanding the domestic market, diversifying products processed from traditional or new aquatic species; pay special attention to introducing, advertising and directing the consumption of aquatic products towards cities, tourist sites, industrial parks, and concentrated residential clusters.

- Building brand names and product quality standards, giving priority to key seafood products, meeting the quality, design and specification requirements of seafood products of the consumption markets.

- Developing specific export orientations and plans for fishery products corresponding to each target market in order to have a suitable development approach and, at the same time, allocating resources reasonably, maximizing Vietnam's competitive advantages in the international market.

- Promoting market opening negotiations, removing barriers for Vietnamese seafood products to access to importing markets.

b) International integration

- Reviewing regulatory mechanisms and policies for fisheries production development in accordance with the provisions of the 2017 Fisheries Law, free trade agreements and international treaties to which Vietnam is a signatory; implementing effectively Treaties and Agreements.

- Setting up and maintaining hotlines used for contacting countries in the region and international organizations in order to settle disputes arising from the exploitation and protection of aquatic resources; responding to climate change, taking part in search and rescue activities, and ensuring safety for fishermen at sea.

- Developing forms of cooperation and joint venture in the fields of production of fishing equipment, gears, aquafeed, aquatic breeds, and aquaculture with regional and international countries. Cooperating with regional fisheries management organizations, and in prospecting or exploration of aquatic resources in deep sea areas, and cooperating in ocean fishery production activities.

- Strengthening international cooperation in training highly qualified staff for the fisheries sector, in the application of new technologies, high technologies and technologies in disease-free breed production, new breed reproduction, marine farming and industrial farming, production of aquatic feed, biological products, medicines for prevention and treatment of aquatic diseases, treatment of wastes, environmental remediation and disease prevention.

6. Enhancement of seafood processing capacity

- Renovating equipment, technologies, investing in and upgrading seafood processing factories to increase productivity, reduce production costs, and protect the environment. Promoting the application of quality management and information technology programs. Developing new, high value and/or bioactive products made from aquatic raw materials and aquatic by-products.

- Ensuring food quality, safety and environmental protection according to domestic and international standards and regulations on food quality, safety, traceability, social responsibility and sustainable development.

- Increasing the proportion of processed products with high quality and competitiveness for domestic consumption and export; rationally shifting the product structure towards increasing the proportion of deeply processed products with high added value. Robustly designing models for developing specialty and traditional aquatic products in linked chains in association with perfecting technologies, improving quality, food safety, designs of products, and registering marks associated with place names.

- Managing to brand several groups of Vietnam’s seafood products such as: Brackish water shrimp, catfish, tuna, mollusk,...

- Forming a number of large seafood processing groups and industrial parks associated with raw material areas. Organizing the construction of logistics systems that closely connect producers, collectors and processors with distributors of seafood products.

- Expanding the markets for importing raw materials that are legal and stable in quantity and quality in order to meet the processing needs for export and domestic consumption.

7. Improvement of capacity for disease prevention, control and environmental protection

- Raising awareness of environmental protection, disease prevention in aquaculture amongst fish farmers and fishermen,…

- Effectively deploying epidemiological maps to control dangerous diseases and aquatic diseases, and proactively containing and stamp out epidemics according to epidemic prevention and control requirements. Firmly maintaining production acreage, optimizing production capacity at ecological farming areas, and developing organic aquacultural farming areas and objects.

- Applying new, advanced and environmentally friendly technologies to minimize and handle environmental pollution during the seafood production process. Adopting managerial approaches and incentive measures for researching and applying technologies for recycling and reusing by-products from seafood production activities.

- Strengthening the inspection, control and organization of community management and supervision to manage the environment and apply strict sanctions upon production establishments that do not comply with laws.

- Investing in perfecting production infrastructure systems, especially waste and wastewater treatment systems, to ensure strict compliance with the provisions of the law on environmental protection.

8. Production organization

- Organizing the linkage between stages in the value chain from raw material production to processing and consumption in all product sectors and objects, creating cohesion, sharing profits and risks among enterprises, producers, input material services and seafood processing enterprises in order to increase productivity, quality and the added value of aquatic products.

- Organizing production models according to characteristics of each field in each region, zone or area. Developing models of cooperative group, cooperative, co-management, joint venture and affiliation between fishery processing and consuming enterprises, fishery businesses and fish farmers. Building large industrial and high-tech farming areas for aquatic commodity production.

- Accelerating the application of scientific and technical advances, widely applying biosafety and epidemic safety production, issuance of codes of farming areas, in association with traceability, food safety conditions and good aquaculture practice (GAP).

- Establishing links with other economic sectors to ensure the harmony between economic sectors in the use of natural and other resources.

- Reducing the number of fishing vessels and production of fish to restore aquatic resources. Establishing fishery cooperative groups and cooperatives. Organizing the implementation of co-management in the protection of aquatic resources; joint venture and affiliation between processing and consumption enterprises, fishery businesses and fish farmers. Duly organizing communications, timely warning of natural disasters for fishermen at sea, ensuring safety at sea, organizing timely responses where distress occurs. Assigning the rights to manage and use inshore waters to fisher community organizations to co-manage, protect and develop aquatic resources.

- Organizing the conservation and exploitation of aquatic resources and developing aquaculture closely and harmoniously linking interests with the development of other economic sectors, such as tourism, energy, transportation and urban or industry development,... in the marine spatial planning and socio-economic development planning of each region and locality.

9. Enhanced state management

- Perfecting the system of fisheries State management organizations, the system of fisheries surveillance organizations from the central to local levels with a view to ensuring it is streamlined, consistent, effective and efficient; ensuring the effective enforcement of fisheries laws; strengthening patrol, inspection and control of fisheries activities, protecting aquatic resources in association with protection of fishermen and national defense and security on sea and islands.

- Applying information technology, digital transformation in the administrative management and fisheries production to meet the practical requirements and development trends of the fisheries sector in the period of international integration.

- Carrying out the decentralization and coordination between governments at all levels in the state management from the central to local level in a consistent system.

- Inspecting and supervising the performance of agencies and units according to their assigned functions and state management tasks and strictly handling violations according to regulations.

- Continuing to strengthen administrative reform in the fishery industry. Focusing on building and completing regulatory mechanisms and policies for industry management, creating a legal corridor for open, transparent production and business activities, in accordance with international practices. Improving capabilities of the contingent of cadres, civil servants and officials of the fisheries sector.

- Strengthening state management measures regarding inspection, control and supervision: Managing fishing ships, fishing workers, quotas allowed in fishing permits; operation of fishing vessels, regulations on fishing gears, zoning for fishing activities, prohibited fishing zones and areas where fishing is banned for a definite period; control of invasive alien aquatic breeds and species, especially aquatic species for ornamental purposes; putting more emphasis on the management of the quality of breeds, aquafeed, medicines for disease prevention and treatment and biological products used in aquaculture; carrying out the quality control of seafood in the chain of products associated with tracking their origin.

- Taking good control of waste sources from fishing, aquacultural or fish processing activities, especially fishery logistics facilities that must meet the current environmental standards.

- Completely building a system of standards, technical regulations, processes, conditions for fishery production and trading as a basis for management of and private sector involvement in a number of stages in the state management of fisheries.

- Taking charge of communication activities, providing information, technical documents on scientific and technical advances; legality and safety in the farming, production, processing and consumption of aquatic products domestically and internationally in order to minimize the adverse effects of international media on Vietnamese seafood products.

V. PRIORITIZED PROGRAMS AND PROJECTS

1. Fishery infrastructure investment and upgradation project.

2. National program for protection and development of aquatic resources.

3. National program for effective and sustainable fishing development.

4. National program for aquaculture development.

5. Marine aquaculture development project.

6. Seafood processing and trading development project.

7. Project on developing science, technology and digital transformation in the fisheries sector.

8. Fishery human resource training and development project.

9. Project on improvement of fishery state management capacity.

10. Project on development of co-management of aquatic resource protection.

11. Fishery environmental protection project.

(Details are given in the Appendix hereto)

VI. FUNDING SOURCES

1. Annual state budget allocations (development investment expenditures, recurrent expenditures) according to current state budget decentralization; Priority is given to investment in infrastructure development, science and technology, improvement of industry management capacity and human resource training.

2. Capital that is integrated in national target programs, other programs, plans and projects.

3. Preferential funds and loans.

4. Capital mobilized from domestic and foreign organizations and individuals in accordance with laws; domestic and foreign organizations and individuals that are encouraged to participate in investment in infrastructure; activities of research, application, production and business in the fishery sector, the markets for consumption of aquatic products and other fields in accordance with the provisions of laws.

Article 2. Implementation

1. The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development shall lead, and cooperate with ministries, sectoral administrations and local authorities in, implementing the Strategy; formulating prioritized policies, programs, proposals and projects and submitting them to the Prime Minister to seek his approval; checking, supervising, preliminarily reviewing, and evaluating the annual and 5-year performance; proposing, recommending and representing issues beyond its jurisdiction to the Prime Minister to seek his decisions on any necessary supplement and adjustment to the Strategy in accordance with practical conditions.

2. The Ministry of Planning and Investment, the Ministry of Finance and the State Bank of Vietnam shall, according to their assigned functions and tasks, complete investment, finance and credit policies in order to effectively meet the objectives and tasks of the Strategy.

3. The Ministry of Science and Technology shall take charge of, and cooperate with the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development in, planning and organizing a council to evaluate Vietnamese standards and regulations, and announcing them according to regulations; implementing solutions to enhancing research and application of science and technology to develop fisheries according to the duties stated in the Strategy.

4. The Ministry of Industry and Trade shall take charge of, and cooperate with the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development in, implementing policies and solutions to promote, develop and expand markets, promote trades, and resolve trade barriers for seafood products.

5. The Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment shall take charge of, and cooperate with the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development in, guiding localities to formulate plans, land use plans, and allocate reserve land for fisheries, especially marine farming, and land policies enabling organizations and individuals to rent land for fisheries development, building of seafood processing facilities, and shall take control of environmental pollution in the fisheries production industry.

6. The Ministry of Labor, War Invalids and Social Affairs shall cooperate with the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development in developing and implementing vocational training, trade shifting programs for fishermen and trade shifting support policies for fishermen communities that are subject to trade shifting requirements or need to switch to other more favorable production and business sectors.

7. The Ministry of National Defense and the Ministry of Public Security shall cooperate with the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development and the People's Committees of coastal provinces and cities in combating illegal, unreported and uncontrolled fishing activities, conducting the tasks of search and rescue at sea and other missions according to its assigned duties.

8. People's Committees of provinces and centrally-affiliated cities shall lead the formulation and implementation of the Fisheries Development Strategy to suit local practical conditions.

9. Fisheries industry associations and societies shall cooperate with the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development in propagating, educating and disseminating the provisions of domestic laws of Vietnam, international laws, Responsible Fisheries Code of Conduct to business communities and fishermen; participate in the formulation and assessment of strategic directions, solutions, mechanisms and policies for fisheries development; participate in building seafood brand names, trade promotion activities, stabilizing and expanding consumption markets; organize networks to provide market information to business communities and fishermen; participate in vocational training, technology transfer, training for fishermen to develop their livelihood or change to other trade in a due manner; support organizations and individuals in investing in development, and organize seafood production activities according to the value chain, ensuring it is a responsible industry, conforms to quality standards and operates in an efficient and sustainable manner.

Article 3. This Decision shall enter into force as from the signature date.

Ministers, Heads of Ministry-level agencies, Heads of Governmental bodies, and Presidents of People’s Committees of centrally-affiliated cities and provinces, shall be responsible for implementing this Decision./.

APPENDIX

PROGRAMS AND PROJECTS PRIORITIZED FOR IMPLEMENTATION OF THE STRATEGY FOR DEVELOPMENT OF VIETNAM’S FISHERIES BY 2030 WITH VISION TOWARDS 2045
(to the Prime Minister’s Decision No. 339/QD-TTg dated March 11, 2021)