NOAA Fisheries Service / NMFS has announced an additional opportunity for sectors to add eligible NE multi-species permits to their rosters as well as an opportunity for permit holders that have signed a sector contract to change the sector affiliation of their permit, for fishing year 2010 (May 1, 2010, through April 30, 2011).
Obama Receives Ocean Credit in New Natural Resources Defense Council Review of 1st Year Green Record
According to their website "The Natural Resources Defense Council works to protect wildlife and wild places and to ensure a healthy environment for all life on earth." The organization lauded President Obama for appointing Dr. Jane Lubchenco as head of NOAA and for moving toward a National Oceans Policy. Read the blog post by Sarah Chasis, Senior Attorney and Director, Ocean Initiative, New York for the Natural Resources Defense Council.
OPINION: Sign on to the call for changing federal fishery law
Thank God for democracy.
We do not need to run to the streets to enforce fairness and justice. We issue an appeal to Congress; and we keep aware that the Congress of the United States is quite busy. It will listen, not to personal, but to popular demands. Hence my plea.
This is an appeal to the public to petition Congress to change an unjust and inefficient law, the Magnuson Law, formally known as the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act. This law has surreptitiously become the Fisherman's Destroyer Act. This law must be changed.
Thanks to the relentless efforts of the Gloucester Daily Times and its dedicated staff in the reporting and editorial departments, very few people need to be told again the gory details of the arbitrariness and strong-arm tactics in the enforcement of this law by the National Marine Fisheries Service and the U.S. Coast Guard. Cumulative evidence is available at www.gloucestertimes.com/fishing.
VIDEO: “Catch Shares Fisherman to Fisherman”
The Environmental Defense Fund released two videos on Catch Shares "Fisherman to Fisherman" on December 4th, 2009. View Part 1
ESPN Oudoors covers planned “United we fish!” protest
"United we fish" will be the rallying cry for both recreational and commercial fishermen as they gather Feb. 24, from noon to 3 p.m., on the steps of the Capitol. They will be there to protest a snowballing avalanche of fisheries closures prompted by revision of Magnuson-Stevens Conservation and Management Act (MSCCA).
"We need to let Congress and NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) know that we are the collective voice of the recreational fishing community and the collective voice does not accept the current broken management system, which wreaks such havoc on all of us and our businesses," said Jim Donofrio, executive director of the Recreational Fishing Alliance (RFA).
Those within the recreational fishing industry point out that a big part of the problem exists now because the NMFS, with oversight from NOAA and the Department of Commerce, did little to properly manage ocean fisheries before revision of the MSCCA. Now, in the face of legislation that requires cessation of overfishing by 2011, the federal agency is overreacting. In other words, the law is a good one because of its intent, but past and present mismanagement is resulting in hardship and chaos.
Editorial: Regulations shouldn’t destroy communities
Commercial fishermen are expected to abide by the regulations set by the federal government.
So shouldn't the government committees and agencies that set those regulations be expected to abide by the laws that govern their authority?
The economic devastation wreaked by punitive regulation on seaport communities like Gloucester here in Essex County is proof that the regulators are ignoring sections of the law they apparently don't like.
Fortunately, it is not just fishermen and their advocates who are starting to question that conduct. The issue is also being raised in Congress by Democratic Congressman Barney Frank, whose House district includes the fishing port of New Bedford, and by Republican Sen. Olympia Snowe of Maine.
In brief, the law that governs commercial fishing — the Magnuson-Stevens Act — requires regulators to make efforts to "minimize adverse economic impacts" when imposing conservation measures.
That is No. 8 of the so-called 10 National Standards, or goals, of the act.
But there is little to no evidence that the economic health of communities is a concern of the National Marine Fisheries Service or regional management councils, which decide things like catch quotas or the amount of time fishermen will be allowed to fish.
New study, new catch-share questions
A scientific study has found that most of the U.S. fisheries operating under catch share management principles show consistency over time in their effect on fishing effort and landing rates — qualities claimed by catch share advocates and Obama administration officials in the growing national debate on its newly announced national policy.
But the study also found "inconclusive evidence as to whether catch shares actually lead to healthier fisheries and ocean ecosystems," according to a summary of the "new scientific analysis" by Timothy E. Essington, an associate professor at the School of Aquatic and Fishery Sciences, University of Washington.
Those qualities have also been claimed extensively by backers of the conversion to catch share regulatory policies, which aim to manage fisheries based on fishermen's actual catch as opposed to the current system of effort controls — limiting their days at sea or access to specific fishing grounds.
OPINION: Fishery council chief’s call for probe should go to back burner
So — even the head of the New England Fishery Management Council is asking U.S. Commerce Secretary Gary Locke for an "independent management consultant" to look into problems among the agencies that hold the fate of Gloucester's and the region's fishermen.
And fishery council chief John Pappalardo may really think it's a pressing need to sort out the relationships among the council, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration offices in Blackburn Industrial Park, and the federal fisheries science center at Woods Hole.
But Pappalardo's request — submitted, like a letter earlier this month from federal lawmakers Barney Frank, John Tierney, John Kerry and 13 of their House and Senate colleagues, to Locke over the head of NOAA chief Jane Lubchenco — seems to target symptoms of the fishery management quagmire, not the disease.
NEFMC Habitat/MPA/Ecosystem Committee meeting scheduled
The New England Fishery Management Council (Council) is scheduling a public meeting of its Habitat/MPA/Ecosystem Committee, in January, 2010, to consider actions affecting New England fisheries in the exclusive economic zone (EEZ). Recommendations from this group will be brought to the full Council for formal consideration and action, if appropriate.
DATES: This meeting will be held on Wednesday, January 13, 2010, at 9:30 a.m.
Sectors: A new course for fishermen
What are fishing sectors all about?
It's about the government trying to give another management option to New England's groundfish fishermen. This new management plan, taking effect in May, will allow commercial fishermen in defined "sectors" to decide on their own how to manage their catch which will be capped by a limit.
The sector concept is a grouping, not a geographical location. It could lay out a new course for fishermen to work together for their mutual benefit, accepting catch limits but designing their own management plan and choosing when and where to fish.
So far, there are 18 New England sectors, including the Port Clyde Community Groundfish Sector made up of members from the Midcoast Fishermen's Association. Officials say joining a sector isn't mandatory but those who continue to fish in the Days at Sea management system would be subject to more stringent rules such as 50 percent cut in Days at Sea (24 days for most fishermen) a 24 hour clock and trip limits on Gulf of Maine cod and Pollock.
The allocation of fish for those wishing to join a sector will be based on past total catches and a time period between 1996-2006 a rule that could rankle fishermen if those were poor fishing years. Groundfish fishermen, cooperatives and fishermen's associations may modify poor allocation by trading, leasing or buying up fishing permits themselves. The state of Maine will be receiving $1 million from the National Marine Fishery Service to start a Maine State Permit Bank to buy groundfish permits or allocation to preserve access to the fishery and help the remaining groundfish fishermen to be viable according to state officials.