High Seas Pocket

A high-seas pocket is an enclave of high seas fully surrounded by the exclusive economic zones of one or more coastal states, also called a donut hole. Because it lies beyond national jurisdiction yet adjoins managed EEZ stocks, it is prone to unregulated fishing on straddling stocks. The best-known case is the Bering Sea Donut Hole, where distant-water fleets took up to 1.4 million tonnes of walleye pollock in 1989 before a 1994 convention imposed a still-standing moratorium. Other examples are the Sea of Okhotsk Peanut Hole and the Barents Sea Loophole.