A small but influential association of Cape Cod commercial fishermen, granted access to a disputed, oversized portion of the harvest when the New England groundfishery was converted to a catch shares system last year, has been leasing out much of its allocation for profit, according to a market report posted by the government.
During roughly the first six months of the fishing season that began on May 1 — the start of the catch share system — the Cape Cod Commercial Hook Fishermen's Association leased the rights to catch close to 2 million pounds of mixed groundfish from its allocation, according to the report of transactions.
The environmental group Oceana issued a statement Wednesday, calling the transactions "disappointing."
Oceana asserted that the "Hookers," which practice lower impact fishing with hook and line or fixed gillnets, were profiting by selling to mainstream fishermen who worked with trawl gear that disrupts the ocean bottom
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