The dilemma and improvement of judicial appraisal of damage to fishery resources in China

With the annual increase in fishery resource damage in China, the number of related cases has also shown a growing trend. To promote civil rights protection and combat criminal activities, it is extremely urgent to improve the judicial appraisal system for fishery resource damage. From the perspective of the development process of legal norms, the regulations in China regarding the forensic appraisal of fishery environmental damage, including the overall framework, appraisal subjects, and identification standards, have all been improved. At the practical level, significant progress has been made in various aspects including appraisal subjects, scope of appraisal, causal relationships, damage assessment and restoration evaluation, as well as appraisal technologies. However, due to the late start and insufficient attention given to environmental damage judicial appraisal in China, persistent issues remain in fishery resource damage judicial appraisal, such as irrational allocation of appraisal subjects, non-standardized adoption procedures, and inadequate support mechanisms. This is specifically reflected in the fact that the number of appraisal institutions and personnel is small and their distribution is obviously unreasonable. A large number of non-statutory institutions are widely involved in the appraisal work, which has affected the objectivity, authority and effectiveness of the appraisal. The status of the inspection report is not clear, and there are loopholes in legal norms.. The virtualization of procedural review and the absence of substantive review jointly lead to the non-standard acceptance procedures of expert opinions and high appraisal costs and insufficient external support. To address these challenges, solutions should be based on theoretical models of judicial appraisal management, collaborative governance theory, and public environmental interests. In terms of subjects, developing diversified appraisal teams and establishing a fishery resource damage judicial appraisal community are essential under the premise of unifying the current legal norms.. In terms of improving the acceptance path, it is necessary to standardize the acceptance review system, clarify the nature of inspection reports, improve the expert juror system, and implement substantive review of appraisal opinions are crucial. In terms of support and guarantee, it is necessary to strengthen the government's environmental supervision responsibilities and increase financial investment. This paper studies the current situation of judicial appraisal of fishery resource damage in China, focuses on the predicaments existing in the operation process, and on the basis of analyzing their causes, puts forward improvement suggestions, aiming to provide some references for promoting the high-quality development of judicial appraisal of fishery resource damage.