The supplemental state budget line item steering $1.3 million into a sonar-based assessment of Gulf of Maine cod stocks — and potentially for other stocks as well — deserves approval by the full Legislature and represents a important investment in the Massachusetts fishing industry.
But, given the time sequence, and questions surrounding the technology and its ability to separate and count specific fish stocks, it's important to note that this new potential new step forward in credibly evaluating numbers of cod and other species won't answer the immediate need for the federal government to address what's become known as the cod crisis in the coming weeks.
And in that vein, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration should commission an urgent new Gulf of Maine cod assessment as well, with rank-and-file fishermen out of Gloucester and other New England ports aboard to help lead a study that would show NOAA is interested in finding the truth, not merely using potentially flawed data that could deal a harsh new blow to the industry — and be proven false after the damage is done.
Read the complete editorial from The Gloucester Times.