S.L. 425.16 Art. 18BFT weighing at harvesting. Cap. 12.

(1) All BFT involved in the harvesting operations shall be weighed according to this regulation.

(2) The Director shall calculate the average eBCD caging weight at caging referred according to Annex 9 of the ICCAT Recommendation 19-04 or according to any other ICCAT instruments providing measures and programmes to estimate the number and weight of bluefin tuna to be caged.

(3) The Director shall maintain a monitoring database for the purpose of monitoring and forecasting the average harvest weight of BFT at harvesting and to estimate the acceptable final HRV per cage:

Provided that any forecasts indicating discrepancies in the acceptable final HRV per cage shall be investigated, and in the case of any forecasted excesses, the Director may order the release of an equivalent amount of BFT into the sea.

(4) For the purposes of validating the harvesting sections of eBCDs according to sub-regulation (5), the Director shall calculate the HRV by raising up this value by the growth factor for bluefin tuna as established from time to time by the ICCAT SCRS or any other growth factor and, or margin of error as may be prescribed by the Director and, or international law.

(5) After applying the provisions of sub-regulations (1) to (4), the Director shall validate the harvesting sections of eBCD only if:

(a) the number of individual BFT declared in the respective eBCD are equivalent to the number of individual BFT verified by the fisheries protection officer at the harvesting operation;

(b) the number of individual BFT declared in the respective eBCD is in line with the cumulative balance as provided by a monitoring database administered by the Director for the purpose of these regulations; and

(c) the weight harvested as declared in the respective eBCD is within the acceptable value of the HRV as provided by said monitoring database.

(6) Failing validation according to sub-regulation (5), and if the weight of the BFT is in excess of the acceptable value of the HRV, the Director shall seize the excess BFT in weight:

Provided that the Director may, at any time prior to the actual harvesting, order the release of live BFT equivalent to any said excess:

Provided further that should any excess result following the actual harvesting, any expenses related to the seizure, inclusive of expenses due for the haulage, transportation and storage of the seized fish, shall be charged against the operator of the aquaculture establishment and such expenses shall be considered as civil debt and an executive title at law and particularly so for the purposes of the Code of Organization and Civil Procedure.