In this Act, unless the context otherwise requires,

"access arrangement" means a treaty, an agreement or arrangement entered into under section 64;

"agent" means a person or unit appointed by the Council to perform designated functions under this Act, or any other agent appointed in accordance with section 67;

"aquaculture" means an activity designed to cultivate or farm fish and any other living aquatic resources;

"artisanal fishing" means the traditional canoe fishing carried on by a citizen;

"Auditor-General" includes an auditor appointed by the Auditor-General;

"authorised officer" means a person appointed under section 95;

"beneficially owned" means for one's own benefit and not as trustee or agent;

"canoe" means a planked dugout, or fabricated vessel which is propelled by

means of sails, oars, paddles, poles, outboard engine or a combination of any of them;

"canoe support vessel" means a vessel which has entered into a contractual

'agreement with a group of canoes to fish for the vessel;

"carrier vessel" means a vessel that carries fish that has been fished by other vessels but does not fish itself;

"citizen" means a citizen of Ghana;

"closed season" means a period during which a ban is placed on fishing activities in respect of type of fish, area, zones, method of capture or the parameters specified in the notice;

"coastal waters" means that part of the fishery waters lying seaward from the baseline from which the territorial sea extends;

"commercial fishing" means a fishing operation resulting or intending or appearing to result in the sale or trade of a fish which may be taken, caught or harvested during the fishing operations, and does not include recreational fishing;

"competent authority" means the body or person vested with authority for the purpose concerned;

"Council" means the governing body of the Commission;

"Court" means a court of competent jurisdiction;

"Director" means the Director of Fisheries;

"drifting gear" means nets that drift or move at their set depth, on or near the surface under wind or current action;

"driftnet" means a net laid out in the sea or river with or without markers or floats or both designed or intended, whilst drifting in the prevailing current or tide, to entangle fish;

"driftnet fishing activities" includes fishing with the use of a driftnet and the related activities including transporting, transshipping and processing a driftnet catch, and provision of food, fuel and any other supplies for vessels used or outfitted for driftnet fishing;

"effort" means in relation to fishing, the time involved and frequency exercised in fishing activities;

"enforcement unit" means the Fisheries Monitoring Control, Surveillance and Enforcement Unit established by section 94;

"exclusive economic zone" means that area beyond and adjacent to the territorial sea which does not extend beyond two hundred nautical miles from the baseline from which the breadth of the territorial sea is measured;

"farming", in relation to fish or any other marine vegetation, means the breeding, cultivating and rearing of fish or the cultivating of aquatic vegetation;

"fish" includes a living aquatic organism, plant or animal, and a fin-fish, shellfish, coral, reptile and marine mammal, but does not include aquatic birds;

"fish aggregating device" includes a man-made or partly man-made floating or semi-submerged device, or directly placed natural materials, whether anchored or not, intended for the purpose of aggregating fish, and a natural floating object on which a device has been placed to facilitate its location;

"fish processing" includes a process that adds value to or preserves the fish and the dismembering, cleaning, sorting, lining, freezing, canning, salting and any other process of preserving fish;

"fish processing establishment" means a place, other than a licensed fishing vessel where fish is canned, dried, gutted, salted, iced, chilled, frozen, smoked or otherwise processed for sale by wholesale in or outside the country;

"fishery" or "fisheries" means one or more stocks of fish or the operations based on those stocks which can be treated as a unit for purposes of conservation and management, taking into account geographical, scientific, technical, cultural, economic, recreational and any other relevant characteristics;

"fishery plan" means a plan for the management, development and conservation of fish;

"fishery waters" includes the waters over which the Republic has fisheries jurisdiction or sovereign rights, including reverie systems, internal waters, territorial sea and exclusive economic zone and any other waters over which fisheries jurisdiction may be claimed from time to time;

"fishing" means,

(a) searching for, catching, taking or harvesting fish,

(b) the attempted searching for, catching, taking or harvesting of fish,

(c) engaging in any other activity which can reasonably be expected to result in the locating, catching, taking or harvesting of fish,

(d) placing, searching for or recovering a fish aggregating device or associated equipment including radio beacons,

(e) an operation at sea in support of or in preparation for an activity within the meaning of this heading, or

(f) the use of an aircraft in relation to an activity described in this definition;

"fishing gear" means an equipment, implement or any other thing that can be used in the act of fishing, whether or not it is used in connection with a vessel, including a fishing net, rope, line, float, trap, hook, winch, boat or an aircraft;

"fishing licences’ includes a fishing right;

"fishing vessels’ includes a vessel, boat, ship or any other craft which is used for, equipped to be used for, or of a type that is normally used for

(a) fishing,

(b) the processing or storage of fish or fish products,

(d) the transportation of fish or fish products from the fishing grounds,

or related activities, a canoe, motor fishing vessel and ancillary vessel, but does not include a vessel used for the transportation of fish or fish products to or from a port of the Republic as a part of its general cargo;

"fixed fishing gears includes fishing gear deposited on or attached directly or in directly to the water bed, fish traps, fishing stakes and anchored gill nets;

"foreign fishing vessels means a fishing vessel other than a local industrial or semi-industrial fishing vessel or a canoe;

"functions" includes powers and duties;

"Funds’ means the Fisheries Development Fund established under section 36;

"Government’ means the Government of the Republic of Ghana;

"industrial fishing vessels’ means a motor fishing vessel equipped with hydraulic equipment and using industrial gears;

"inshore exclusion zones means that area of the fishery waters described in section 81 (1);

"large local semi-industrial vessels means a local semi-industrial vessel of a length of ten metres or more;

"length" in relation to a vessel means the overall length from bow to stern;

"licensed fishing vessel" means a fishing vessel specified in a valid fishing licence;

"local fishing licence" means a fishing licence issued under this Act in respect of a local industrial or semi-industrial fishing vessel and a licence for a canoe;

"local fishing vessel" means a fishing vessel as described in section 47 or 52 (2) and artisanal and motor vessels;

"marine reserved means a reserve established in the fishery waters in accordance with this Act;

"master, in relation to a fishing vessel, means the person for the time being in command or apparently in charge of that vessel;

"Minister means the Minister responsible for Fisheries;

"Ministry means the Ministry charged with responsibility for Fishery;

"moving gear" means a fishing gear dragged, towed or moved by any means for the purpose of fishing;

"motor fishing vessel" means a fishing vessel other than a canoe which is, at relevant times, constructed or adapted for the purpose of fishing and equipped with one or more inboard engines for the purpose of moving through water;

"operator includes a person who is in charge of, directs or controls a vessel, the owner, charterer and master;

"over fishing" means operating a fishery beyond the level of exploitation necessary to ensure sustainable yield of the fishery resources;

"owner", in relation to a fishing vessel, includes a person exercising or discharging or claiming the right of accepting the obligation to exercise or discharge any of the functions of an owner whether on behalf of the owner or on behalf of another and a person who is the owner jointly with any other person or persons and a manager, director or secretary of a body corporate or company, but does not include a person in possession under a charter-party;

"qualified company means a company or partnership,

(a) registered under the Companies Act, 1963 (Act 179) or with its principal place of business in the Republic, and

(b) the shares in which are beneficially owned wholly by the Government, a citizen, a public corporation or an association of any of them;

"recreational fishing" means fishing done for leisure and not for the purpose of subsistence, barter or sale of fish;

"Regulation means the relevant Regulations made under this Act;

"related activity includes doing, attempting or preparing to do or having done any of the following

(a) transshipment,

(b) storing, processing or transporting fish taken from the fishery waters up to the time the fish is first landed, or

"Republic" means the Republic of Ghana;

"reverie system" includes a natural drainage system comprising rivers and their tributaries which originate from the sources and terminate at their estuaries, and lagoon, lake, an impoundment, a dam or weir artificially created on the reverie system;

"seaworthiness" means the fitness of a vessel with reference to the condition of its hull and machinery, the extent of its fuel and provisions, supply, the quality of its officers and crew, and its adaptability for the type of voyage proposed;

"small local semi-industrial vessel" means a local fishing vessel of a length below ten metres;

"seine" includes fishing gear in the form of a net which is used to capture fish by surrounding them and pulling them vertically or horizontally from the water, and beach seine, purse seine and ring nets;

"semi-industrial vessel" means a motor fishing vessel powered by an inboard engine, and excludes artisanal fishing vessels and industrial vessels as defined in this section;

"sustainable yield" means the quantity of fish that can be taken from the resource from year to year without danger of collapse or stock depletion;

"support vessel" means a vessel carrying out operations in connection with and in support of a fishing vessel, including supply and any other fishing activities;

"surveillance officer" includes an authorised officer of a vessel or an aircraft used for the enforcement of this Act;

"towing gear" means fishing gear with a bag or cod-end which is towed at the bottom or mid-water by a motor fishing vessel and used for the purpose of taking fish;

"transshipment" means transferring a fish or fish products to or from a vessel, whether or not the fish has first been taken on board the vessel from which the fish is passed;

"trial fishing operations" means fishing operations undertaken over a limited period of time by virtue of section 65 for the purpose of testing the feasibility of commercial fishing operations with a view to the establishment of fishing operations locally or in the region of the operations;

"tuna" includes tuna-like species of fish and sharks;

"vessel" means a fishing vessel;

"zone" means the inshore economic zone declared under section 81.