U.S. certifies shrimp-shipping countries

U.S. certifies shrimp-shipping countries    The U.S. State Department has certified 39 countries and one economy to import shrimp into the United States after they successfully proved their harvesting techniques do not harm sea turtles.
   The department announces these certifications annually on May 1 and bases them in part on the results of verification visits by State Department and National Marine Fisheries Service teams to exporting countries.
   Fifteen countries use 'turtle excluder devices' to prevent accidental drowning of sea turtles in shrimp trawls. They are Belize, Colombia, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Guyana, Honduras, Madagascar, Mexico, Nicaragua, Nigeria, Pakistan, Panama, Suriname and Venezuela.
   Twenty-four countries and one economy have shrimp fishing environments that do not pose a danger to sea turtles. Of these, eight countries and one economy harvest shrimp using manual rather than mechanical means or use other shrimp fishing methods not harmful to sea turtles. They are the Bahamas, China, Dominican Republic, Fiji, Hong Kong, Jamaica, Oman, Peru and Sri Lanka. The 16 other countries have shrimp fisheries in cold waters where the risk of taking sea turtles is negligible, the State Department said.
   A State Department DS-2031 form signed by the exporter and importer must accompany all shrimp imports into the United States. If shrimp products are from a non-certified country, a government official of the harvesting country must certify the shrimp was caught without harming sea turtles.