Saving Seafood

Opinion

LINDA BEHNKEN & MIKE CONROY: Sustainable fisheries are facing a moratorium

November 17, 2020 — American wild-caught seafood is integral to the nation’s food supply and to American food security. We’ve been working hard to keep it that way in the face of climate change. The people who catch fish for a living experience climate impacts directly. We recognized it early and we’ve responded. In fact, U.S. fishermen have been part of the solution to habitat conservation and climate responses for decades.

Nonetheless, some politicians and environmental organizations have embraced a version of an initiative called 30×30 (“thirty by thirty”) that would damage our nation’s sustainable fisheries and robust fisheries management process. Broadly, 30×30 aims to conserve 30 percent of habitat worldwide by the end of the decade — 2030. The 30×30 approach has been embraced by President-elect Biden’s campaign, and there’s talk he will sign an executive order on his first day in office.

We’re eager to engage with the new administration to address climate impacts and protect habitat. Proactive and durable ocean policy changes need to happen with us, not to us.

Our organizations have advocated for strong ocean conservation for decades, and we’ve built a fisheries management system that will continue to provide enduring protections to ocean habitat while insisting fishermen participate. The results are striking: we’ve established deep-sea habitat protection areas covering over 45 percent of U.S. waters off the West Coast. In 1998 we prohibited trawling off the entire coast of Southeast Alaska. Recently, the New England and Mid-Atlantic regions enacted major deep-sea coral protections that prohibit the use of impactful gear in sensitive areas.

Read the full opinion piece at The Hill

LEIGH HABEGGER: Alaska fisheries and restaurants need immediate relief

November 5, 2020 — Alaska is often referred to as the “seafood powerhouse,” and rightfully so. With more than 50% of our country’s seafood landed here, options for seafood are plentiful — whether you’re looking for a buttery halibut fillet to go with a glass of chardonnay or a cod sandwich and cold beer. But our fishermen and our restaurant partners are struggling because of COVID-19.

In addition to supplying Americans and the world with some of the freshest, most sustainable seafood, the state’s seafood industry created $5.6 billion in total annual economic activity for Alaska in 2018. Fishing is a huge economic driver for the state. But, between March 1 and April 16 of this year, more than half of restaurants in Alaska closed temporarily and more than 80% of restaurant employees were laid off or furloughed. We saw halibut prices cut in half practically overnight.

Nationwide, independent restaurants have lost more jobs than any other industry, affecting 11 million employees within the industry and more than 5 million workers they support in the supply chain. Alaska is no different: Leisure and hospitality have accounted for 38% of all jobs lost in our state during the pandemic. This pandemic directly endangers the 31,800 Alaskans working restaurant and food service jobs, and the countless farmers, fishermmen and other livelihoods that depend on restaurants’ supply chains.

Read the full opinion piece at the Anchorage Daily News

BEN PLATT: Close to Home: Ropeless fishing gear won’t save whales

October 27, 2020 — If you live in one of California’s historic fishing communities like Bodega Bay, you’ve probably heard the term “ropeless” crab fishing gear. That’s the new buzzword for equipment being promoted by environmental groups to solve the perceived problem of whale interactions with fishing gear.

These groups have convinced the California Department of Fish and Wildlife to adopt onerous new regulations that will force crab fishermen to adopt expensive, impractical and unproven fishing gear that will put most of us out of business. It will economically devastate — to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars annually — many coastal communities that rely on the fishing and seafood industry. And unfortunately, these regulations are set to go into effect on Sunday.

But the action these environmental groups are promoting isn’t based on the best available science. In fact, it isn’t based on any science or data at all. They claim that the number of deaths of humpback whales caused by entanglements are now high enough for the population to slip into decline.

The truth, however, is something different.

Whale population numbers are soaring. John Calambokidis and Jay Barlow from the Cascadia Research Collective, a respected marine mammal study center, recently released a report titled “Update on blue and humpback whale abundances using data through 2018.” The researchers concluded that current estimates for the California-Oregon humpback whale population is 5,612 and 1,593 for the Washington-Southern British Columbia humpback whale population. This results in a new estimate totaling 7,205 for the California-Oregon-Washington humpback stock. This figure shows that whales are abundant and not in danger. It’s far higher than the previously thought 3,500 figure.

Read the full story at The Press Democrat

USDA Secretary Perdue: USDA to protect Alaska’s seafood from China’s retaliation

October 27, 2020 — For years now, President Donald J. Trump has been standing up to China and other nations, sending the clear message that the United States will no longer tolerate unfair trade practices. While trade damage from unfair retaliation has impacted a host of U.S. commodities, including American seafood, President Trump is taking action on trade policy to open new markets so that American agriculture can compete globally.

High tariffs disrupt normal market patterns, affect prices and export volumes, and raise costs by forcing commodities to find new markets. Additionally, there is evidence that American goods shipped overseas are being slowed from reaching market by unusually strict or cumbersome entry procedures, which can affect the quality and marketability of perishable products. This can boost marketing costs and discount our prices, and adversely affect all those in the Alaska seafood industry.

We always suspected that American agriculture and the world-class seafood industry would likely be among the hardest hit sectors, because our producers are extremely productive and are excellent competitors in the world marketplace. Indeed, of the total tariffs imposed on the United States, a disproportionate amount was targeted directly at our fishermen. In keeping with President Trump’s promise, this administration will not stand by while our hard-working men and women of the seafood industry are treated unfairly by countries acting in bad faith.

Read the full opinion piece at the Juneau Empire

JOHN KERRY: China’s Chance to Save Antarctic Sealife

October 26, 2020 — Even as the United States and China confront deep disagreements, there is a global challenge that simply won’t wait for the resolution of our differences: climate change.

While some have decided that we are entering a new Cold War with China, we can still cooperate on critical mutual interests. After all, even at the height of 20th-century tensions, the Americans and the Soviets negotiated arms control agreements, which were in the interests of both countries.

Climate change, like nuclear proliferation, is a challenge of our own making — and one to which we hold the solution. We have an opportunity this month to make clear that great power rivalries aside, geopolitics must end at the water’s edge — at the icy bottom of our planet in the Southern Ocean, which surrounds the entire continent of Antarctica.

The first post-World War II arms limitation agreement — the Antarctic Treaty signed in 1959 at the height of the Cold War — banned military activities, created a nuclear-free space, set aside territorial claims and declared the continent a global commons dedicated to peace and science. Now we have the opportunity to extend that global commons from the land to the sea.

Read the full opinion piece at The New York Times

Northern Lights: Eat Seafood, America!

October 5, 2020 — “Eat Seafood, America!” is the driving message of an effort aimed at helping Americans stay healthy during this covid-19 public health crisis as well as boosting the U.S. seafood economy, supporting the 2 million American workers in the seafood industry.

This rapid-response initiative launched in early April has been successful in encouraging consumers to eat more fish and shellfish. Of consumers surveyed in June and July, those who reported seeing the Eat Seafood, America! messaging were three times more likely to have increased their seafood consumption in the last two months.

Supported by the newly formed Seafood4Health Action Coalition of more than 46 organizations (full list is available at eatseafoodamerica.com), convened by Seafood Nutrition Partnership, this unified consumer outreach campaign works to help Americans build habits to eat more sustainable seafood. In the first four months, the integrated consumer outreach campaign earned nearly 300 million potential impressions.

Read the full opinion piece at National Fisherman

SEAN HORGAN: Fishery in Hail Mary mode

September 28, 2020 — A quick recap: The council has been working on the measure — Amendment 23 — for more than two years. It seems like 50.

The amendment will set future monitoring levels for sector-based groundfish vessels. The council faces four alternatives: Monitors aboard 25%, 50%, 75% or 100% of groundfish trips. The council has chosen 100% coverage as its preferred alternative.

That’s not good for the groundfishermen. Once the federal government stops harvesting spare change from between the sofa cushions to keep reimbursing the fleet for at-sea monitoring, the onus for paying falls on the fishermen at a current tune of about $700 per day per vessel.

If 100% monitoring carries the day, it will add an estimated $6.4 million of additional costs across the fishery. The fishermen aren’t even patting their pockets. They are serious when they say it could easily spell the end of the fleet.

So this is a big deal.

Environmental groups have poured in resources and comment in support of the preferred alternative. If they set a betting line on fisheries management, conservationists would probably be heavy favorites.

The industry is in Hail Mary mode. The long pass, not the prayer. Though at this point, it’s a difference without a distinction.

In a letter, the Northeast Seafood Coalition reached out to Gov. Charlie Baker for support and leadership on the issue — Massachusetts stands the most to lose within the fishery — and was rewarded with a palpable silence.

Sixteen members of the Massachusetts Legislature, at the urging of Senate Minority Leader Bruce Tarr and others from fishing communities, signed a letter asking the council to reject Amendment 23 as currently constituted. They cited the measure’s inconsistency with a number of standards within the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act and executive orders.

Read the full opinion piece at the Gloucester Daily Times

GLOUCESTER DAILY TIMES: Monitoring plan puts small businesses at risk

September 25, 2020 — Imagine trying to run a Main Street business — a restaurant or gift shop, maybe — during the COVID-19 pandemic. A cratered economy and the threat of disease make each day a challenge and the future uncertain. Now imagine the government dropping another $700 in fees on you every time you open your doors. There’s no way your mom-and-pop operation could survive.

Yet that’s just what the New England fishing industry is facing as regulators move closer to requiring that boat owners pay to have a government monitor on every trip. The monitors — the federal government calls them “observers” — assess the health of fish stocks and make sure fishermen are following the rules.

The New England Fishery Management Council, which essentially sets the rules for commercial fishing in the region, will meet next week to decide how often monitors will be required on fishing vessels — 25%, 50%, 75% or 100% of trips. Early indications are that councilors will require a monitor on every trip, with the average cost of $700 to be borne by fishermen. Regulators have thus far turned their backs on industry pleas to have the government pay for the program, or develop less-intrusive electronic monitoring programs.

Read the full story at the Gloucester Daily Times

RICK ROBINS & JEFF PIKE: Time for change in the Atlantic scallop fishery

September 23, 2020 — The Atlantic sea scallop fishery is a success story, at least in terms of stock rebuilding and biological sustainability. From an efficiency perspective, however, the fishery is off course.

The outdated management approach for the limited access scallop fleet of one boat-one permit-one allocation has tied the hands of vessel owners, increased operational costs, effectively barring captains and crews from the pathways to ownership that their predecessors enjoyed, and added unnecessary safety risks on the water. There are too many boats spending too few days on the water, leaving the scallop fleet hamstrung as it navigates the choppy waters of a global pandemic and lower predicted harvests.

A typical full-time limited-access scallop vessel harvests its annual scallop allocation in around 70 days, leaving vessels tied to the dock more than 80 percent of the year. The only growth option is to buy another permit, which means buying another vessel. This is a cost-prohibitive option for independent operators, since it forces them to take on steep capital costs and pay for ongoing maintenance expenses for a redundant vessel.

Although one vessel could easily harvest the allocation of two limited-access permits, the fleet has no flexibility to do so. With harvests predicted to decline, meaning even fewer days on the water, the lack of flexibility will only cost more and leave more boats tied to the dock for more days. What’s more, the current system means that if a captain or crew get sick (a serious possibility in the age of covid-19), a vessel breaks down, or some other calamity hits, there is no back-up plan to fish the allocation.

Read the full opinion piece at National Fisherman