[Congressional Record Volume 169, Number 191 (Friday, November 17, 2023)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1117]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                            SAVING NEMO ACT

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                              HON. ED CASE

                               of hawaii

                    in the house of representatives

                       Friday, November 17, 2023

  Mr. CASE. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to urge my House colleagues to 
join in protecting our world's fragile coral reef ecosystems by 
restricting international imports of protected ornamental reef fish and 
coral species collected by destructive and unsustainable practices.
  Our oceans are indispensable to life on our planet, not only to our 
global environment but to the billions that are directly or indirectly 
reliant on its resources. Our oceans in turn rely on the health and 
diversity of our coral reefs, some of our most diverse ecosystems, with 
nearly 25 percent of the ocean's fish dependent on coral reefs for 
shelter, food and reproduction. And our coral reefs are interdependent 
with healthy, diverse and sustainable marine flora and fauna.
  Among these are prized ornamental reef fish and coral species highly 
valued by collectors. While it is possible to collect them at 
sustainable levels which do not harm the coral reef or broader marine 
ecosystem, high demand leads too often to unsustainable and destructive 
collection practices such as overcollection of species overall, 
overcollection of younger specimens, collection through reef-dredging, 
gill nets, explosives or poison, and harm to specimens leading to 
excessive deaths in transit. Most of the collection occurs 
internationally where most of our world's coral reefs are found, in 
countries, such as in Southeast Asia, which do not have strong 
regulation or enforcement regimens against unsustainable or destructive 
practices.
  As the largest importer of ornamental reef fish, our country has both 
responsibility for creating the demand that leads to such practices, 
and the opportunity to channel that demand to sustainable collection. 
The Saving Natural Ecosystems and Marine Organisms Act would do so by 
prohibiting the import into our country of protected reef species taken 
using unsustainable or destructive practices. The enforcement mechanism 
would be administrative certification, in conjunction with cooperating 
collecting countries where possible, that ornamental reef fish and 
species to be imported into our country were collected without 
following those practices.
  I ask for my colleagues' support of this bill which is one piece of a 
much larger effort to save our oceans from their own worst enemy: us.

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