Balancing the Tides

Front matter

Balancing the Tides

Marine Practices in American Samoa

JoAnna Poblete

Contents

Preface ix Frequently Used Samoan Terms xiii

List of Abbreviations xv

CHAPTERI Native Commercial Fishing and Indigenous Debates over Regulations in the U.S. Pacific 23

Preface

As a Filipino-Chinese-Portuguese American PhD student in history at UCLA at the dawn of the twenty-first century, I started graduate school wanting to study Filipino American legal history. After taking an Asian American jurisprudence course at the law school, I realized Filipinos had more legal connections to Puerto Ricans and Chamorros than other Asians who came to the United States due to the War of 1898, the subsequent Treaty of Paris, and the 1901 Insular Cases. From that moment, I knew I wanted to study and write about the experiences of U.S. colonials, whom I define as groups under the direct authority of the United States, across time and space. Overall, my intellectual goal is to make visible and center the histories of unincorporated territories and their peoples within larger U.S. narratives and American perspectives.

While not a manageable dissertation project, my advisor and chair, Henry Yu, encouraged me to think of my desire to study the impact of unincorporated territorial status on colonized groups as a life-long career goal. I have been privileged and fortunate enough to have the ability to follow this advice and engage in research projects about Filipinos and Puerto Ricans in Hawaiʻi for my dissertation and first book, American Samoans for this second book, and U.S. Virgin Islanders for a nascent third book project. In the long term, I hope my research, writing, and teaching can help us think comparatively about historical and contemporary connections among all U.S. colonials for greater understanding and potential future coalition building.

My research for Balancing the Tides started in 2008 during my time as a Carolina Postdoctoral Faculty Diversity program fellow in the History Department at UNC-Chapel Hill. The success of my first trip was greatly facilitated by the initial contacts provided by Roderick Labrador, who got me in touch with Jacinta Galea‘i, and Stephen Thom, who connected me with the amazing Oreta Togafau (now Oreta Crichton). I am also forever grateful to my mother, Lucille, who accompanied me during the first week of this trip and bravely approached any Filipino she came across. Jacinta and Oreta provided my first taste of the generous Samoan spirit, faa Samoa, one loaning me her car during the weekdays and the other inviting me to stay in her home for this trip and every other

X PREFACE consecutive visit. The librarians at the Feleti Barstow Public Library, especially Cheryl Morales and Justin Maga, were extremely kind and helpful. Likisone Asotau also gave me an excellent tour of the Chicken of the Sea factory for a firsthand, close-up look at the tuna canning process.

While I was able to publish a preliminary article in 2010 on the closing of the Chicken of the Sea factory, the next several years were full of teaching in my tenure-track position at the University of Wyoming and publishing my first book in 2014. I was finally able to return to my research in American Samoa that same year. Support from the Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research, the University of Wyoming International Travel Grant, the University of Wyoming College of Arts and Sciences Basic Research Grant, as well as research monies from my current institution, Claremont Graduate University, funded my trips to American Samoa from 2014 to 2016.

Iam so blessed that every year I have traveled to American Samoa, Oreta and her family have hosted me in their home. Iam humbled and proud to be part of their Ziga, appreciative of all their professional and personal support through the years. Oreta also helped me set up meetings with several government officials and community members in 2014, who in turn recommended more people to contact and so forth until I interviewed over one hundred people related to my research topics for this project through this snowball approach. I am grateful for the time and support of every single individual who spoke with me, whether their name is mentioned in this work or kept confidential by request. Those who went above and beyond the normal scope of assistance during my research trips or while I was off-island include Clarence Crichton, Saumaniafaese Uikirifi, Nate Ilaoa, Keniseli Lafaele, Hillary Togafau, David Herdrich, Alice Lawrence, Patty Page, Joseph Paulin, Jeremy Raynal, and Fofo Sunia.

In addition to individual interviews, primary source documents, archival materials, scientific reports, and historiographical texts were used to write this story of American Samoa. While working in this region has been a personal joy and honor, as a historian this orally based culture has sometimes presented challenges in locating and obtaining consistent written sources and data. Some histories in this work have been reconstructed through the tellings of multiple people and confirmed as best as possible with available documentary evidence. As scholar Fikret Berkes has stated, “The written page will never be an adequate format for the teaching of indigenous knowledge” (2012, 38). This work is not and cannot be an exhaustive look at all historical ocean policies in American Samoa. Nevertheless, I have tried diligently to provide as accurate a narrative as possible for the case studies I present. While many issues discussed in this

Preface xi book are connected to several contemporary and current events, out of a need for an end point in research, all statements are based on the policies in existence through August 2018. I apologize in advance for any errors or gaps in information that may have inadvertently resulted from this research process.

I am deeply appreciative for amazing colleagues at the several institutions I have been a part of since 2008. In particular, I would like to thank Maile Arvin, Janet Brodie, Keith Camacho, Faye Caronan Chen, Nicole Choi, Holger Droessler, Lori Anne Ferrell, Joshua Goode, Jennifer Hayashida, Isadora Helfgott, Jennifer Ho, Char Miller, Lin Poyer, Phil Roberts, Carolina San Juan, Kiri Sailiata, Ronald Schultz, Lisa Uperesa, and Kathy Yep for their feedback, support, and assistance through the years. I would also like to thank my research assistants, Kaitlyn Bylard, Jonathan Hanna, Lara Kolinchak, Mike Pesses, and Gary Stein for all their hard work and creativity in finding sources for my work and helping me with manuscript cleanup. In particular, Michael Pesses did an amazing job with the maps and charts. Special thanks also goes out to my cousin, Joanna Sokua, who provided her artistic abilities for some last-minute illustrations on fishing styles. I am grateful to my colleagues at Claremont Graduate University for always being excited about my research on unincorporated territories and encouraging me to teach what I study, bringing along our students for the ride. I truly appreciate all the comments and help from those at UH Press, especially my editor, Masako Ikeda, editorial assistant Debbie Tang, the managing editor and staff at UH and Longleaf, as well as my two manuscript readers. And finally to my pack, Mike and Matli, you are the rocks that I draw strength from FOR EVS.

Tapu

Va

Va fealoai

FREQUENTLY USED SAMOAN TERMS family, descent group untitled men

please

the Samoan way Samoan legislature chief

foreigner

power, political authority taboo

social relations

social respect xiii

ASG ASLLE CFMP CBMRM DOC DMP DEIS DMWR EEZ LVPA ONMS NOAA NMFS NMS SFR TEK VMPA WPacFIN Wespac WWII

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

American Sāmoa Government

American Sāmoa Longline Limited Entry program Community-Based Fisheries Management Program community-based marine resource management Department of Commerce

Draft Management Plan

Draft Environmental Impact Statement Department of Marine and Wildlife Resources Exclusive Economic Zone

Large Vessel Prohibited Area

Office of National Marine Sanctuaries

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration National Marine Fisheries Service

National Marine Sanctuary

U.S. Federal Sport Fish Restoration Program traditional ecological knowledge

Village Marine Protected Area

Western Pacific Fisheries Information Network Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council World War II

XV

Introduction

Where is American Samoa? And why does this region have the word “American” in it? This set of five islands and two atolls in the South Pacific is the most southern territory of the United States in the last time zone of the globe. American Samoa is 2,566 miles southwest of Hawai‘iand 4,719 miles southwest of the continental U.S. West Coast. The total landmass of this region is almost seventy-seven square miles, with a population of 55,519 according to the 2010 census. Through a set of treaties between the U.S. Navy and local chiefs in 1900 and 1904, this area became an unincorporated territory of the United States and has maintained that status through today. Over the years, this location has served as a U.S. Navy port, particularly important during World War II, a major site for tuna canning, and the location of the largest National Marine Sanctuary in the United States.

This book examines the unique experiences of American Samoans in contrast to other U.S. colonials, or people under direct U.S. authority, who became part of the U.S. empire at the turn of the twentieth century.' The United States engaged in colonialism (or direct government control over another region), as opposed to imperialism (which involves extended efforts to influence another region’s governance, but usually does not entail direct control), in places like Hawaiʻi, the Philippines, Puerto Rico, and Guam.

Despite active protests by the majority of Native Hawaiians, their islands became a U.S. territory in 1900, instantly converting the indigenous population into U.S. citizens against their will. After the U.S.-Philippine War in 1902, the U.S. federal government dictated the Philippines’ government and economy until independence was granted in 1946. Puerto Rico was an unincorporated territory under U.S. leadership from 1898 until becoming a Commonwealth in 1950.‘ Chamorros have lived in an unincorporated territory of the United States since 1898 (except for Japanese occupation during World War II). In these U.S. colonies, federal leadership controlled all decision making in the beginning, gradually providing local representation in government positions after a significant period of assimilation to American values, ideals, structures, and processes. While stories of U.S. colonialism in Hawaiʻi, the Philippines, and Puerto Rico are familiar to many, the history and contemporary effects of U.S. rule in American Sāmoa, as well as Guam, are quite invisible.

The common story of the U.S. government’s takeover and control of island colonies was not the case in American Sāmoa. Instead of native customs being erased by missionaries, as in Hawai‘i, and intense Americanization initiatives such as those in the Philippines, Puerto Rico, and Guam, American Samoa differed from other colonized regions because the U.S. government has historically accommodated indigenous practices in this area. From the beginning of their official relationship with the United States in 1900, American Samoans maintained indigenous control over their local governance. While the United States held authority over larger structural affairs, such as international trade, global diplomacy, and the military, the traditional Samoan fa'amatai (chiefly system of leadership and decision making) managed daily life.

The U.S. federal government consistently used island colonies for monocrop export industries (that profited U.S. corporations) and strategic military sites. In Hawaiʻi, Puerto Rico, and the Philippines, sugar became those regions’ major agricultural export. American Samoa became a site for the monocrop of tuna canning, which will be discussed in chapter 2. These island regions, as well as Guam, also became sites for major military bases. However, unlike the experience of other U.S. colonials who have generally come under full federal control, American Samoans have always had a degree of independent action. According to a 2012 U.S. Department of Commerce report,

Although the Department of the Interior has administrative oversight of the Territory of American Samoa, there is only a limited amount of direct Federal involvement there. The Federal government owns no land on American Samoa except for an uninhabited atoll 150 miles from Tutuila.... There are no military installations in the Territory, nor any energy facilities serving an area outside the Territory. The primary Federal agencies with interests in American Samoa are resource protection oriented. With the exception of the U.S. Coast Guard, all relevant Federal authorities concerned with Federal resource protection laws have their offices located over 2000 miles away in Honolulu, or over 4000 miles away in Seattle or San Francisco. Due to this lack of a continual presence, enforcement of Federal resource protection laws is irregular at the Federal level.‘

The federal government openly acknowledges its minimal economic, bureaucratic, military, and legislative involvement in this unincorporated territory. Consequently, the maintenance of local indigenous rule since 1900 significantly differentiated colonization in American Samoa from other island territories of the U.S. empire.

This work examines U.S. federal marine policies and programs in American Samoa to highlight historic U.S. colonialism in the region. According to postcolonial ecology scholars Elizabeth DeLoughrey and George Handley, “European Enlightenment knowledge, natural history, conservation policy, and the language of nature—the very systems of logic that we draw from today to speak of conservation and sustainability—are derived from a long history of the colonial exploitation of nature.”” Imperialism, colonialism, and empire building are at the root of land occupation, as well as resource categorization and use. Subsequently created, as well as supposedly scientific, hierarchies and priorities place indigenous groups like Pacific Islanders at the bottom of social, economic, political, and cultural structures throughout environmental and empire history. Such Western-based ideals about the appropriate use of the environment and proper modern lifestyle patterns have drastically altered the lives of indigenous groups. The following chapters highlight the shifts in marine practices in American Samoa away from self-sufficient subsistence living to a cash-based, export economy and the precedence of Western-based scientific and ecology ideals in environmental practices since World War II.

The following case studies also show how U.S. federal ocean-use policies connect contemporary scientific and ecological prerogatives to continued U.S. control and authority over the region and its people. As Sasha Davis discussed, the desire to possess and control Pacific Island regions stems from the U.S. empire’s ultimate goals to protect globalization and free market trade in the Asia-Pacific region.® The ability of U.S. vessels to move and exchange easily with markets throughout the Pacific Rim remains a key motivation to retain island colonies and continue to regulate ocean use in the region. Mansel Blackford also argued for “the tremendous importance of government policy in shaping the fishery and the fishery’s global scope. . . . Regulation and development went hand in hand.” The expansion of U.S. federal marine regulations during the twenty-first century results in continued U.S. authority over American Samoans, as well as a strong influence on the global fishing industry.

However, like work by sociologists Cluny Macpherson and La‘avasa Macpherson, this study views island colonies as “a site where global forces confront local ones, and Samoans are assumed to be active agents in the transformation of their society.” The following case studies also demonstrate the human priorities of economics, local control, and indigenous rights by American Samoans. While Westerners have prioritized wilderness and conservation, indigenous groups are more concerned about “arable land and potable water, public health, the threats of militarism and national debt, and reflect social planning for cultural, economic, and national sovereignty”! Often times, native issues are distinct and separate from colonizers’ interests.

In fact, ideals, goals, and standards in a colonized territory and for its local population do not always coincide with, support the needs of, or have the same impact or resonance in the continental United States. Stateside environmental efforts and economic regulations, such as national marine sanctuaries and minimum wage standards, seem positive and moral from a lower-48 perspective. However, these same rules have adversely influenced ground-level employment, local industries, and native access to ancient fishing grounds in American Samoa. As historian Karl Jacoby has stated about Native Americans, U.S. “conservation was but one piece of a larger process of colonization and state building in which Indian peoples were transformed (in theory, at least) from independent actors to dependent wards bound by governmental controls.”!” Western-based initiatives have also imposed nonnative standards, practices, and ways of knowing on this indigenous group.

Native issues versus federal issues in colonized American Samoa are complex and layered, sometimes tense and fraught. Examining the intersections of environment and empire widen understandings of fundamental questions of difference, power, and privilege that postcolonial ecology studies emphasize. This work discusses the complications involved in the unique shared governance in American Sāmoa, the impact of government policies on this indigenous group and the United States, as well as the ways in which native American Samoans have expressed their views about government regulations of marine practices and ocean-related management policies in the post- World War II era.

Brief Historical Background

Researchers believe the first Samoans, known as the Lapita people, originated from Melanesia. This group migrated from New Caledonia to Fiji, then Tonga and Samoa more than 3,500 years ago. Over two thousand years ago, Samoan political and social systems “were fully developed and operating” at independent village, clan, and regional levels." These people then started to explore regions in more eastern areas of the Pacific, influencing cultures as far as the Hawaiian

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Islands. According to 4 History of American Samoa, during this period “there was much exchange and intermarriage between Samoa, Fiji, and Tonga.”"*

More than 1,300 years ago, Tonga occupied the Samoan islands for over 300 years until Samoans from places like Manu‘a in the east and Upolu in the west revolted against this empire.” After that overthrow, a series of Samoan chiefs competed for control over various islands in the archipelago. More than four hundred years ago, struggles over royal titles heightened and divided communities across the islands into the nineteenth century.'* During this period, strong rivalries among diga (descent groups) throughout this region resulted in violent clashes among Samoans.

In 1722, the first Westerners made contact with the Samoan islands, led by Jacob Roggeveen, a Dutch expedition leader for the West India Company. However, Western settlement did not occur until Congregationalist members of the London Missionary Society arrived in 1830. Just ten years prior, some of the first informal missionaries came from Tahiti and Tonga.” Methodists in 1835, Roman Catholics in 18.45, and Mormons in 1865 followed these two groups of initial proselytizers.'* From the 1850s on, France, the Netherlands, Great Britain, and the United States were also interested in acquiring the last available regions of the world for Westerners to expand their empires at this time: the islands of the South Pacific.” Germans started to develop strong interests in the harvesting, processing, and exporting of copra from Upolu in the 1870s. The Kingdom of Hawaiʻi also tried to form a confederation with Samoa in 1887, but those efforts ended after the Bayonet Constitution was forced on King Kalakaua later that same year.”

In 1899, three Western countries agreed to partition the area through the Berlin Treaty without consulting Samoans or any other native groups. Germany took control of the western Samoan islands, Great Britain gained authority over Tonga, the Solomons, and areas of West Africa, and the United States obtained authority over the eastern Samoan islands.”! One year later, the U.S. Navy negotiated a Deed of Cession with Tutuila chiefs. On April 17, 1900, the U.S. Navy and twenty mdtai (chiefs) of the island signed a document granting the U.S. government sovereign rights over the lands and waters of Tutuila, Aunu'u Island, and the surrounding area, specifically “all other Islands, rocks, reefs, foreshores, and waters lying between the thirteenth degree and the fifteenth degree of south latitude and between the one hundred and seventy first degree and the one hundred sixty seventh degree of west longitude from the Meridian of Greenwich.””

This agreement also stated that “the Government of the United States of America shall respect and protect the individual rights of all people dwelling in Tutuila to their lands and other property. ... The Chiefs of the towns will be entitled to retain their individual control of the separate towns, if that control is in accordance with the laws of the United States of America.... But the enactment of legislation and the General Control shall remain firm with the United States of America.” This verbiage maintained the right of the indigenous population to govern local society and manage land according to their traditional practices, as long as these conventions did not conflict with U.S. regulations.** However, the United States held ultimate political and legal rule over the area.

On July 16, 1904, Tuimanua, the king of the Manu‘a Islands, and his five chiefs signed a similar agreement for the northeastern portion of this archipelago, including “the whole of eastern portion of the Samoan Islands lying east of longitude 171 west of Greenwich and known as Tau, Olosega, Ofu, and Rose Island, and all other, the waters and property adjacent thereto.”” This treaty stated that “the rights of the chiefs in each village and of all people concerning

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their property according to their customs shall be recognized.”” Once again, the United States gained overall control with the stipulation that customary Samoan systems remained protected.

Together, these Deeds of Cession created tiered governance in the region that allowed the continuation of local indigenous practices and accepted general native subordination to U.S. governance. This shared political-legal authority, heavily steeped in Western methods of geographic calculation and nonnative notions of individual property rights, remains in effect today in this unincorporated territory of the United States.”

Why was the United States interested in shared authority in these islands and why did Samoans agree to hand over the sovereignty of their islands? In addition to participating in global empire building at the time, the U.S. government viewed Pago Pago Harbor as a key location for a coaling station between Asia and the Americas.” Some, like researcher Joseph Kennedy, believed that the

U.S. Navy did not want to take on responsibility for full control of the islands, therefore willingly agreed to joint authority over the region.” The United States was already fighting a bloody war for control in the Philippines.*° With strong resistance to U.S. rule in that archipelago, as well as other Western powers in the region willing and ready to take their place, the U.S. Navy was open to a degree of shared governance with indigenous leaders in Samoa to gain their loyalty and cooperation. Joint authority also meant the U.S. Navy could keep other foreign investors out of the region while maintaining a South Pacific pathway to Asian markets. This arrangement allowed the United States to have overall authority that could remain limited indefinitely, but could also be expanded when needed at a moment’s notice.

In fact, scholar Christina Duffy Burnett has claimed that “American imperialism has also consisted of efforts to impose limits on expansion: to draw lines around what counts as properly "national" territory,” providing ways to reduce “the number of contexts in which the government must take up the responsibilities that come with such power.” Shared authority in American Samoa, unincorporated territorial status for Guam, the Philippines, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands, informal protectorate status for Cuba, and purely extractive rights in the Guano Islands all demonstrate such an approach to U.S. expansionism. By avoiding full-fledged responsibility towards these locations, the U.S. government can reap all the benefits of exploiting these regions without the cost or burdens of providing citizen-level support and rights to the people living in these places.

Since Western powers had been vying for power in the region since the mid-1800s, and were likely to persist in the area, Samoan chiefs might have seen the United States as the best option among the determined empire builders from the west. Chiefs on Tutuila and Aunu'u were traditionally treated as vassals by the high chiefs of Upolu and Savai‘i. Aiga from the eastern islands might have viewed the United States as a good protector from the tensions and conflicts with the western islands in the nineteenth century.” In 1872, High Chief Mauga gave the U.S. exclusive rights to use Pago Pago Harbor, and in 1873, Tutuila chiefs petitioned for the annexation of American Samoa by America. While the U.S. Congress never passed annexation, the U.S. Senate did ratify a treaty in 1878 giving the United States the right to establish a naval station at Pago Pago.” These negotiations set the foundation for future U.S. presence and control on Tutuila.

Kennedy also discussed how Samoans wanted to keep local governance but have U.S. protection without much sacrifice of their independent action in the years following the Deeds of Cession.** Regardless of the ultimate reasons for this political arrangement, the shared custody of power over American Samoa has led to some conflicts, disagreements, and disconnects between U.S. federal policies, guidelines, expectations, and regulations and indigenous Samoan interests, desires, culture, and values.” This work will explore the intricacies of combined governance through the lens of marine practices, labor issues, and ocean resources in the region since the mid-twentieth century.

Allowing traditional Samoan leadership and local control was acceptable to the U.S. federal government during the first half of the twentieth century because until World War II, this region was not considered an important area of US. jurisdiction. This territory lost its turn-ofthe-century strategic military value due to a shift from coal to steam-powered naval vessels, as well as other American bases established in Hawaiʻi and the Philippines. After serving as a significant supply and mustering station for the Pacific theater of World War II, this Pacific archipelago once again fell to the back burner of federal government concern.

With the closing of the U.S. naval base at Pago Pago in 1951, American Sāmoans started migrating in large numbers to Hawaiʻi, the continental United States, and Guam to pursue cash-based wage labor jobs to support their families.’ As Fa‘anofo Lisaclaire Uperesa and others have shown, a strong historic and current belief exists that material success “is possible only through migration abroad and taking advantage of opportunities provided by the United States.” Outmigration continues today, with an average of 7,804 people leaving the region for work each year from 2006 to 2016, about 14 percent of the total population.’ Such movement is used as opportunities to improve both the economic circumstances of migrants and their families at home who often receive financial support from those abroad. These remittances have provided an uncalculated but significant contribution to supporting diga and village economies in American Samoa.”

In 1963, a Reader's Digest article highlighted the poverty level conditions in this periphery of U.S. empire. Author Clarence Hall admonished the U.S. government for leaving this area to languish in deprived circumstances, describing how “government buildings were peeling and rotting on their foundations, beautiful Pago Pago Bay was marred and befouled by hideous over-water outhouses, rutty and teeth-jarring roads unrepaired for years. ... Public schools are unequipped shacks.”*° In response, President John F. Kennedy authorized infrastructure improvement projects and social services that lasted through 1967. These projects included the development of radiotelephone services, extensive road repairs, educational television, the construction of a new conference building, hospital, and hotel, as well as the opening of a second tuna cannery. This temporary push to improve conditions in American Samoa ushered in the next major set of Western-based structural changes in the region.

From that point forward, the U.S. government encouraged the tuna canning industry in the region, discussed in chapter 2, and later started to pour federal grants and monies into the local economy. High tax and tariff breaks, as well as variable minimum wage and lax labor standards, encouraged the development of this commerce as a major source for the Gross Domestic Product, besides federal grants, in the territory. Since 2007, about 57 percent of territorial income has come from the tuna canning business, with an average of 30 percent coming from government funding.*!

Despite such federal government influences in the region, as scholar Kirisitina Sailiata has written, the long-term continuation of indigenous practices can be seen as a unique form of American Samoan resistance to colonization.” Indigenous demands for more representation under federal rule have occurred in American Samoa since the Mau in 1920, which involved native protests against their poor treatment by the U.S. Navy.“ Since that movement, Samoans have pushed for increased indigenous self-governance at various times, but have not sought complete separation from the United States. This native group established a territorial constitution in 1960, a full-time legislature in 1971, and the first elected governor in 1977. Until the 1980s, American Samoans exercised control over local environmental management. Local leaders also determined wage policies until 2007.

The full-time Samoan legislature (Fono), emulates both Western and indigenous political structures. One component of the Fono involves eighteen popularly elected officials in the House of Representatives. The second section of the Fono is the Senate, which consists of fifteen members appointed by the “council of chiefs, in accordance with Samoan custom.”* The allocations for both branches are based on traditional Samoan counties. While the names of each component of the legislature and the election of House representatives reflect U.S.-based governance models, the members of the Senate and district lines follow customary native Samoan pule (political authority).

The American Samoa Government (ASG) has struggled to keep the region’s economy afloat since the establishment of the Fono in 1971. Every elected governor has faced administrative deficits. Several corporate efforts to establish businesses in the region were initiated but failed to stay operational long-term. These short-lived industries included a small assembly plant for Bulova watches,

Introduction II a Meadow Gold dairy manufacturing plant, a First National City Bank branch, and the Dory commercial fishing boat program that will be discussed in chapter 1. Proposals to start a third tuna cannery and an oil refinery were also brought forth but rejected by the ASG.“ By 1975, manufacturing and production plants shut down due to the general worldwide recession.“ Other impediments to the establishment of alternative industries in the 1970s included U.S. tariff agreements with developing countries and changes in territorial customs inspections.“ By 1979, the five-year territorial economic development plan decided to focus ASG Department of Commerce efforts on the fishing industry and agriculture.