I 111th CONGRESS 1st Session H. R. 4369 IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES December 16, 2009 Mr. Frank of Massachusetts (for himself, Mr. Tierney, Mr. Jones, and Ms. Pingree of Maine) introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Natural Resources A BILL To allow the United States-Canada Transboundary Resource Sharing Understanding to be considered an international agreement for the purposes of section 304(e)(4) of the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act.

1.

Short title

This Act may be cited as the International Fisheries Agreement Clarification Act.

2.

International fisheries agreements

Section 304(e)(1) of the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act (16 U.S.C. 1854(e)(1)) is amended— (1)by inserting (A) after (1); and (2)by adding at the end thereof the following: (B)The United States–Canada Transboundary Resource Sharing Understanding and other related Understandings, and decisions made under those Understandings, shall be taken into account for purposes of paragraph (4)(A)(i). Paragraph (4)(A)(ii) shall not apply to those portions of stocks covered by such Understandings. Notwithstanding section 302(h)(6) of this title, fishing level recommendations regarding rebuilding in any given year for such stocks may be exceeded as long as the fishing mortality level allows for progress toward rebuilding affected fish stocks, and overfishing is ended immediately according to the procedures set forth in this subsection. .

3.

Effective date

The amendments made by section 2 shall apply with respect to fishing years beginning after April 30, 2010.