The CNMI government would oppose any expansion to the Marianas Trench Marine National Monument similar to what was recently done for the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument, according to Manny Pangelinan, acting secretary of the Department of Land and Natural Resources. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe don\u2019t see the need to expand the monument. First, we got a monument here that we have to take care of. We want to see whether this monument is adequate or not,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Some involved with the creation of the MTMNM have made known their support of the expansion PRIMNM via social media, calling for expanding the monument here as well.<\/p>\n
Pangelinan, however, believes that any expansion to the monument would first have to assess its current state.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have not given this monument a chance to develop or evolve itself,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Pangelinan said the necessary regulatory framework and enforcement in the monument have yet to be put in place.<\/p>\n
From there, the CNMI can see whether the policy and regulations and management in place are working, he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is a huge monument,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
He also pointed to the lack of enforcement in the monument as another reason, and cited funding, which he singled out as one obstacle in the monument\u2019s delayed visitor\u2019s center.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe CNMI does not have the capability or funding resources to monitor this monument all the way up to Sarigan. We need the partnership and the assistance of the U.S. so we can help each other monitor this,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
He said realistically speaking not too many people in the CNMI have the capability to go fish all the way to the Northern Islands and not leave an impact on the area.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey don\u2019t have the vessel capability to do long-line fishing,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
MTMNM, established in the same year as the PRIMNM in 2009, has yet to see a visitor center established or a timeline for one.<\/p>\n
Pangelinan, a member of the Mariana Trench Monument Advisory Council, said there has not been much development since public meetings on the visitor\u2019s center last month.<\/p>\n
President Obama expanded PRIMNM on Sept. 24 from 87,000 square miles to almost 500,000 square miles, creating the world\u2019s largest marine reserve in the Pacific.<\/p>\n
The Friends of the Monument recommended that MTMNM\u2019s boundaries be extended to include its northern waters, and to close the entire monument to sustenance, commercial, and recreational fishing in a letter to Delegate Gregorio Kilili C. Sablan in 2009.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The CNMI government would oppose any expansion to the Marianas Trench Marine National Monument similar…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":47,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[26,1174,541,375],"class_list":["post-182142","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news","tag-cnmi","tag-marianas-trench-monument","tag-northern-islands","tag-president-obama"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/182142","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/47"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=182142"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/182142\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=182142"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=182142"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=182142"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}