June 21, 2017 — The following was released by the New England Fishery Management Council:
Following a review of written and oral public comments collected during the Feb. 17-April 3 scoping process, the New England Fishery Management Council today approved an extensive range of alternatives for development and further consideration in Groundfish Monitoring Amendment 23.
The Council identified the amendment’s purpose and need and then voted to include the following elements to achieve the purpose:
- Electronic monitoring (EM) alternatives;
- A dockside monitoring program option;
- Alternatives to determine the total monitoring coverage rate, including reevaluating the 30% coefficient of variation (CV) precision standard and how it is applied, for example, on a fishery vs. stock level;
- An option to facilitate knowing the total coverage rate at a time certain to assist sectors for business planning; and
- Proposals to streamline and improve the sector weekly reporting process.
Regarding electronic monitoring, the Council voted to include the following items for further development and analysis within the range of alternatives:
- EM as an approved alternative to at-sea monitors to directly estimate discards;
- An audit-based approach where EM operates on 100% of the trips with a subset of hauls or trips reviewed to verify vessel trip reported discards; and
- A maximized retention approach where EM verifies that all groundfish are landed and dockside monitoring is used to sample catch.