8550, could further open up municipal waters to commercial fishing activities. “It is obvious that the announcement was the result of the continuous lobbying of big-fishing firms to operate within the municipal waters,” said Pamalakaya chair Fernando Hicap in a statement. 10654 which defines the jurisdiction of local government units, and Section 18, which opens the use of municipal waters to commercial fishing activities. “There can be no harmonization between the municipal fishers and commercial fishing vessels because the latter outcompetes with the traditional method of fishing,” Hicap said. This includes the installation of vessel monitoring measures on commercial fishing vessels and electronic reporting system of fish catch that should be publicly accessible.
