§ Mr. DafisTo ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, pursuant to his answer of 12 June,Official Report, column 320, what efforts are currently being undertaken by his Department to encourage worldwide measures to ban dolphin encirclement in all fisheries.
§ Mr. CurryThe United Kingdom has always strongly supported measures to protect cetaceans in international fora. The practice of encirclement is carried out by purse-seine fishermen in the eastern tropical Pacific, and no United Kingdom or Community vessels are involved. I welcome a recent agreement by the Inter-American Tropical Tuna Commission, involving 13 countries with an interest in the eastern tropical Pacific yellow-fin tuna fishery, to reduce drastically the level of dolphin mortality by 1999.