The American Fisheries Society has presented Brian Rothschild, the University of Massachusetts-Dartmouth research scientist and professor, its prestigious Oscar Elton Sette Award for "sustained excellence in marine fishery biology."
The day after receiving the award last week during the society's annual meeting in Seattle, Rothschild presented a talk that was critical of the Obama administration's hotly disputed catch share policy — brought in by NOAA administrator Jane Lubchenco.
He used the transformation of the New England groundfishery as a case study, noting that New England landings were down from 41,230 metric tons to 32,765 metric tons in the first year of catch shares which ended April 30, based on a monitoring report from the Northeast Regional Office in Gloucester.
Jobs were fewer and more boats were inactive too, Rothschild said, citing a report from the Northeast Regional Fisheries Science Center in Woods Hole.
And he explicitly called out NOAA for marketing the system with "misleading characterizations" or "half truths."
Read the complete story from The Gloucester Times