Fishing ban starts on China's major rivers

WUHAN - A three-month fishing ban on the southern Pearl River and a section of the Yangtze River took effect Wednesday, in an effort to protect fishery resources and maintain ecological balance.

The banned section of the Yangtze is located between Gezhou Dam in Central China's Hubei province and the estuary in Shanghai. Another fishing ban was imposed on the rest of the river in February.

According to officials with the Ministry of Agriculture, during the fishing moratorium, law enforcement will be carried out against illegal fishing tools and activities. The local governments will provide allowances to fishermen affected by the ban.

Large-scale activities will be organized to release fish fry into the two rivers during the moratorium in order to boost aquatic life resources and help improve the environment.

The annual fishing ban was initiated in the Yangtze River in 2002, while it was initiated in the Pearl River in 2011.

The fishing ban has, to some degree, contained the deterioration of fishery resources of the two rivers in recent years, Cao Wenxuan, expert of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, said.

Hopefully, a full year fishing ban will be introduced in the future to better protect the aquatic life, he suggested.