Agents from the Department of Interior US Fish and Wildlife Service are helping fisheries officers in American Samoa prepare to enforce federal and local laws during the Pacific Arts Festival.
Special Agent, George Phocas, says the influx of visitors from different parts of the Pacific, bringing cultural and customary artifacts and practices would expose the territory to certain risks.
"Those things that we want everybody to think about are pressures on local resources - for example sudden pressure on fisheries or maybe the Pe'a and the Lupe. There will be some people who decide that they want to eat some of our things and we hope that's not the case. In case someone wants to be less than a gracious guest that's our job. To perhaps remind them that that's what the rules are here."
