A draft law on the introduction of a moratorium on industrial fish catch in the water basins of Dnipro, Southern Bug, Western Bug, Siversky Donets rivers starting from January 1, 2016 was registered in parliament on July 27.

The authors of draft law No. 2454a are Radical Party MPs Oleh Kupriyenko, Vasyl Amelchenko, Petro Poroshenko Bloc MPs Mykola Tomenko, Oleksandr Chernenko, Oleksiy Mushak, and independent MP Serhiy Rudyk.

According to the explanatory note to the draft law, the document is aimed at providing the realization of Ukraine's ecological policy in the use, protection and production of water living resources, their rehabilitation and environmentally friendly use.

The law would not apply to special industrial zones in water reservoirs of the Dnipro cascade, which cannot exceed 40% of the water area of one reservoir and are to be located no closer than 200 meters from the river line.

According to the draft law, the borders of the zones are to be defined by the Cabinet of Ministers on the basis of scientific grounds upon the recommendation of the central executive power agency responsible for the formation and realization of the environment protection policy under agreement with the central executive power agency realizing the state fish industry policy.

A moratorium on the issue of permits, approval of limits and distribution of quotas for industrial fish catch will be introduced.

This does not apply to documents that permit industrial fish catch in special industrial zones, water bio-resources catch for research, experiments and examination, control bio-resources catch to define their state and stocks, and reclaim catch with the purpose of forming their optimal species and age structure.