Mr. STEVENSON. Mr. Chairman, I think we all are concerned that the next Law of the Sea Conference should be a successful conference. I think this is most important. And I think that the role of this preparatory work in leading to a successful conference is very crucial.

All members of our task force are in agreement that the next year's Law of the Sea preparatory work will be critical to a successful conference.

Senator HOLLINGS. You mentioned Spain in several points in your statement, and also Tanzania, but not Morocco. What is the Moroccan position on the other side of the Strait of Gibraltar?

Mr. STEVENSON. Morocco's position has been basically similar to Spain's although it was only recently in this summer's session that they amplified to a great extent their position.

Senator HOLLINGS. How is the United States going to approach the issue of these offshore artificial islands such as the one contemplated for powerplant facilities off New Jersey?

Will the construction of these structures affect the delineation of baselines or what would be the U.S. position?

Mr. STEVENSON. We are definitely developing a position in an interagency task force on that at this time. And I hope we will be able to give you a more definitive answer early next year.

Senator HOLLINGS. But that answer will not be formulated until the carly part of next year?

Mr. STEVENSON. No, sir.

Senator STEVENS. Mr. Stevenson, are you saying that we really cannot expect too much to come out of the Law of the Sea Conference in 1973?

Mr. STEVENSON. Senator, I think the general feeling amongst those delegations that spoke last summer was that we need two more prepatory sessions prior to the conference, and our delegation and our industry advisory committee feel very strongly that we also need constructive intersessional work in order to have a successful conference.

This would mean that the minimum schedule that would provide. for this is something along the lines proposed by the chairman of the committee, and which was supported by most of the delegations that spoke, which would have the real substantive work done in 1974, beginning early in 1974.

Senator STEVENS. With regard to the seabed, I don't see that there is any great urgency. I understand technology isn't reaching the problems of the continental margin yet, anyway. However, with regard to fisheries, it seems to me that if we have any further delay, we may reach the point where our fisheries resources are so far depleted that agreement internationally won't do us any good.

Mr. STEVENSON. We have, throughout the negotiations, stressed this point ourselves, Senator.

This is why we were so concerned about the delay of the substantive discussion of fisheries in Subcommittee II, and we are constantly fighting for a fisheries working group to be established.

Senator STEVENS. Is there any possibility we could separate the fishing concepts from the law of the sea and press ahead with those and leave the problem of straits and the problem of the seabed for the later conferences that you mentioned?

Mr. STEVENSON. Our original proposal, Senator, did contemplate approaching these different problems in so-called manageable packages.

But there was virtually no support, except from the Soviet Union and one or two other maritime states, for that approach.

The overwhelming sentiment is to have a comprehensive approach. And I think, in addition, that those countries which favor this approach do so because they were not participants in the prior conferences, because they were not fully independent or because they think it best serves their interests. I think it's fair to say that there are also a great many countries that feel with the increasing complexity of the uses of the sea, where it's being used for many different purposes at the same time, that you have to have a more comprehensive approach or you don't adequately deal with the problem.

I think it's also fair to say that many feel that the only way to get overall general agreement to a law of the sea settlement is to make it a single treaty so that countries can't pick and choose what they like and not subscribe to what they dislike.

I might say, though, on the question of preparation that as far as the technical drafting and the production of new articles, that it's in the seabed area where most of this has to be done.

And that's the area where there has been more work because Subcommittee I hasn't been held up by this procedural logjam.

With respect to fisheries, the actual drafting is not so complicated or difficult once you have agreement. And, as I indicated, there has been a good deal of agreement among the vast majority of the countries in terms of a general direction on fishing, although there are still very strongly held different points of view.

But I think that there is substantial determination in the committee, I think increasingly so among the African and Asian countries, to reach agreement.

Senator STEVENS. I see Mr. McKernan is going to present a statement. I am sure he will adequately represent the position of the United States with regard to fisheries.

I read in all the Eastern papers about these great fishing fleets that are supposed to be off the east coast and they don't even realize what's off the west coast in terms of the North Pacific.

A billion and a half pounds of pollack alone in one year, according to the statistics I received, were taken by foreign fishing fleets. The hag are gone entirely. There is great pressure on herring. Yet, we still seem to be negotiating. Most of the fishermen think we are negotiating for military rights and the seabed development of minerals. Meanwhile the fishing interests will be completely depleted by the time we get around to even talking. The fisheries situation is analagous to the Paris peace talks, in terms of deciding what the size of the table should be, before we get around to talking and really doing something about the fishing.

The Japanese, Koreans, and Russians are utilizing monofilament nets that they are bringing into our waters. We find more and more that they are being cut loose. One of them was found anchored with a radio buoy, so they could go back and pick it up.

Such conservation practices used by these foreign nations in the North Pacific will mean that before agreements on straits, military aspects of the right of free passage, and seabeds are reached, we are not going to have any fisheries left.

My feeling, which I think is reflected in the attitude expressed by the fishing organizations, is that these issues should not be put to

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gether. The United States should be pushing to separate the fishing apects from these other concepts, which will take years to work out. Senator HOLLINGS. I understand Ambassador McKernan does not have a prepared statement but will answer questions.

Could he come forward now and be seated with you, Mr. Stevenson, so maybe he can answer the Senator's questions here and find out where he fits in your priority?

Is he a head of minerals and oil, or is he third or last or where?

Mr. STEVENSON. Let me say before Ambassador McKernan speaks, as we said earlier, we are trying to accommodate all the U.S. vital interests and not sacrifice one for the other.

Senator HOLLINGS. What is your comment on Senator Stevens observations?

STATEMENT OF HON. DONALD L. McKERNAN, COORDINATOR OF OCEAN AFFAIRS AND SPECIAL ASSISTANT TO THE SECRETARY FOR FISHERIES AND WILDLIFE, DEPARTMENT OF STATE

Mr. MCKERNAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

The United States has attempted to give attention to the very large fleets of foreign nations fishing off the west coast of the United States as well as off the east coast.

In fact, we have a number of arguments with the Soviet Union. and Japan, attempting to protect the interests of the United States fisherman on the west coast of the United States and Alaska.

We are intending to renegotiate these arguments within the next few months, in fact. And recently we visited Alaska and consulted with Alaskan fishermen as to how best to proceed in our next round of agreements with Soviet Union and Japan to even better protect the interests of American fishermen.

Now, it's true, as the Senator has stated, that the Soviet Union and Japan are taking very large quantities of fish in the North Pacific and Bering Sea. In fact, they are taking much larger quantities than the U.S. fishermen are.

But, for the most part, we have attempted to keep these foreign fishermen off of species of primary concern to the United States. Now, we haven't been totally successful.

Present arrangements are imperfect. But we have attempted to keep them away from fishing areas and on species of primary economic importance to the United States.

And in the case of Alaska, pollack, for example, we do not have a fishery for Alaskan pollack, so our primary concern there is to try and see that these foreign fishermen conserve the resources.

And we are trying to set up arrangements to exchange information and work with their scientists to make certain that there is conservation of these resources

Nevertheless, basically of course I agree with Senator Stevens, that more needs to be done to protect the interests of our fishermen and we are trying to do so through the law of the sea.

Mr. Chairman, I would like to make one more comment in support of what Mr. Stevenson has said, and in answer to a question raised by Senator Stevens.

And that is that why don't we separate the fishing issue, for example?

1 think if we take a look at the 1958 convention we have another reason for going the route that we have chosen. The 1958 convention on living resources has only been ratified by some 30 or 35 nations. And only two or three of these are really high seas fishing nations.

The nations of most concern to the United States, Japan and the Soviet Union, for example, did not find all aspects of that convention well suited to their interests and so they have never ratified it.

So I want to indicate that I favor the point of view, the approach that Mr. Stevenson has mentioned, and I think that if we want to get agreements that will be recognized by a larger number of nations, particularly those that are interfering with our fishing interests. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Senator STEVENS. I appreciate that statement, Mr. Chairman, and I, of course, have great confidence in Mr. McKernan

Congress has declared a moratorium on the taking of ocean mammals. Their food chain is the pollack and the bottom fish-both which the Japanese, Russians, and Koreans are taking.

Ocean mammals are now going to reproduce in unlimited numbers depending on their food chain. We have got, I think, a new competitor in the North Pacific and Bering Sea-the ocean mammal that is not subject to any kind of taking to protect his own food chain. And at the same time the Russians and Koreans are coming in there in great strength every year.

We are still a developing country as far as the fisheries of this nation are concerned. We have never developed our fisheries the way we should. And yet we are saying that the developing countries can have some sort of priority in terms of developing their fisheries. On the other hand, we, as a developed country who has ignored our fisheries, are going to be penalized now under these concepts, as I understand them, in terms of any type of recognition of our rights to our own fisheries.

I see you both looking straight at me on that point, but that's the way I understand the situation.

No one can say that the Alaska fishery is a developed fishery as far as the United States is concerned. It is a developing fishery as far as Russia and Korea and Japan are concerned, but we have ignored it. Senator HOLLINGS. Give us generally the differences between the philosophies of the developing nations and those of the developed nations. In all of those negotiations what are considered developed and undeveloped nations, what is the difference?

Mr. STEVENSON. Well, I think that in this area, while you do have certain issues where there is a difference between the developed and developing countries as such, you have many other differences which cut across that particular division.

For example, you have the land locked, shelf-locked countries, which are very numerous indeed in a continent such as Africa, which have a different interest than the coastal developing countries. They have, in fact, have organized their own group to reflect their interests.

They are different interests as far as maritime freedom is concerned, depending on states' location.

So it is not only a developing-developed divsion, although that, of course, continues to be one of the important dividing lines.

With respect to Senator Stevens' statement I want to be very clear that the U.S. present fisheries proposal does not make a distinction in

terms of the preference of the coastal state with respect to coastal species and with respect to salmon, or with respect to the coastal state management and conservation jurisdiction, between developed and developing states.

This is, in fact, the distinction that the Soviet Union and Japan have been making and that is why we regard their proposals as completely unsatisfactory from the standpoint of the U.S. fishing industry.

Mr. McKERNAN. If I could just make two remarks, Mr. Chairman, with respect to Senator Stevens' statement. He certainly is, in my judgment, an expert in this field in his own right, and I agree with him that Alaska in many respects is developing fisheries and is in areas where great development in this field can take place.

Once again, our proposal provides for coastal state control over coastal fisheries themselves and, for all practical purposes, all the resources of interest for Alaskan fishermen would be under the control of the United States for conservation purposes at least, and where we have an economic interest, that is where we are fishing the resources, we would have preference over any foreign fishing of those resources. Senator STEVENS. I understand that and our people are very happy about that. At least it begs the question in terms of the area in which the coastal state will have primary jurisdiction of coastal species. Yet you have not defined any season in this concept. I have been asked if this refers to coastal species within the 12-mile limit, or does it mean the coastal species that are being taken by the fisheries at the coastal state. Is there some sort of grandfather right concept that is being established now, for instance, by the Japanese and Russians in terms of some of these species meaning, that, even if your new proposal is accepted, they would still maintain a right to continue the exploitation of our coastal species?

Mr. McKERNAN. You have asked really two important questions, Senator. In the first question the answer is that our particular proposal would give the coastal state control of coastal species wherever they are found.

Now, these species would be identified perhaps in an appendix to the article itself, and they would include such species as Alaska pollack, ocean perch, flounders, halibut, and other species of interest and economic concern to Alaskans potentially, or in fact being used right at the present time.

Senator STEVENS. Let me interrupt. Even if they went beyond the 200-mile limit, if they were considered coastal species in the case of halibut who do move considerable distances, they would still be subject to the jurisdiction of the United States under your approach?

Mr. McKERNAN. Yes.

Now, in terms of resources not fully used by the United States, this is and important concept from the standpoint of the United States.

As you well know, Senator, one of our largest and most important fisheries is the shrimp fisheries of the Gulf of Mexico, Caribbean, and northeastern South America, and to provide some little protection for that important fishery, we have provided that resources not used by the coastal state should be available for other states. This gives some protection for our shrimp fishery.

It also then would allow the full development of the food resources of the ocean. No nation could essentially set up a fence around a certain part of the ocean and allow thse renewable resources to lie fallow and