§1411 Findings and Policy

Summary

The law says that fishing for yellowfin tuna in the eastern tropical Pacific Ocean has killed millions of dolphins. Growing concern has led to changes in how people fish. U.S. tuna boats helped invent safer fishing ways, and U.S. tuna companies have promoted dolphin-safe tuna. Other nations agreed to join deals that set yearly limits and aim to cut dolphin deaths down toward zero. Recognizing the International Dolphin Conservation Program will help keep dolphin deaths falling, protect dolphin groups, and keep eliminating dolphin deaths a priority. The United States’ policy is to stop deaths of dolphins and other marine mammals caused by deliberately surrounding them with purse seine nets, to support the International Dolphin Conservation Program toward that goal, to prevent the U.S. market from rewarding tuna caught with driftnets or by purse seine boats in the eastern tropical Pacific that do not follow the Program, to secure agreements so U.S. tuna boats can keep fishing in the South Pacific Ocean and elsewhere, and to encourage observers on purse seine boats fishing outside the eastern tropical Pacific when the Secretary finds dolphins or other marine mammals regularly associate with tuna and are being encircled.