WASHINGTON – March 22, 2012 – Around 1,000 commercial and recreational fishermen from around the country gathered near the U.S. Capitol on Wednesday to call attention to the regulatory difficulties facing the fishing industry on the East and West coasts.
The rally, billed as Keep Fishermen Fishing, was organized to seek reforms to the Magnuson Stevens Act, the law that governs fishing in federal waters.
Fishermen and industry groups have long complained that inflexible and onerous regulations are hampering their ability to fish and forcing some independent fishermen to abandon their traditional way of life.
New Bedford Mayor Jon Mitchell was among those who spoke at the rally. "There was a great show of support from the fishing community and a big turnout from Congress," he said. Several senators and around a dozen House members spoke at the gathering, according to the mayor, including a large New England delegation that included Massachusetts Sens. John Kerry and Scott Brown and Reps. Barney Frank, John Tierney and Bill Keating.
Bristol County District Attorney C. Samuel Sutter, running against Keating for Congress in the 9th District, also spoke.
Dr. Brian Rothschild from the School for Marine Science and Technology at UMass Dartmouth, also addressed the rally and said later that its achievement had been "to provide the politicians with ammunition."
Fishermen in the Northeast are now harvesting only a fraction of their allowable catch, he said, due to ineffective fishery management. In 2010, only 32,000 metric tons were landed in New England from a catch limit set at 95,000 metric tons, according to Rothschild. "That's a $200 million shortfall and thousands of jobs," he said.
The theme that emerged among the many speakers at the rally was strong congressional support for introducing more flexibility to the regulations, Rothschild said.
"NOAA needs to do a better job, think things through and be held accountable," he said.
Richie Canastra, co-owner of the Buyers and Sellers Exchange seafood auction in New Bedford also joined the rally, which mirrored a similar demonstration two years ago on the same spot.
"There were less fishermen but more members of Congress speaking than two years ago," he said. "I think we have their attention. Now let's see if they can get things done."
Various environmental groups issued statements opposing the rally's aims. The Pew Environment Group said in a press release that the reforms being proposed "would derail years of hard work to end overfishing and rebuild depleted U.S. ocean fish populations."
Read the story in the Standard-Times