Saving Seafood

Rep. Peltola’s fight for salmon debuts in Resources Committee

September 23, 2022 — Alaska’s new congresswoman wants her new colleagues on the U.S. House Natural Resources Committee to understand how dire the fish crisis is for families in her home region, the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta, where people depend on salmon for food. On Wednesday, she told them about one Kuskokwim fisherman who usually harvests 2,000 chum salmon a year.

“Because he has a dog team, and a very large family. So typically, every summer he would harvest 2,000 chum salmon,” Rep. Mary Peltola said. “Two summers ago, he was only able to harvest two chum salmon.”

The impact of her anecdote in the U.S. House Natural Resources Committee room was hard to measure. Republicans attended in force to skewer many provisions in a Democratic bill to re-write the Magnuson-Stevens Act, the primary federal fishing law. Some spoke of how important sportfishing is to their families and communities.

It was an unfinished goal of the late Congressman Don Young to renew the bill. Now Peltola, in her first committee session as a member of Congress, is trying to pass a version that will refocus fisheries management to address the needs of subsistence fishermen — particularly in Western Alaska, where salmon have become painfully scarce. One of her main campaign themes is that she’ll fight for salmon but she’s facing strong headwinds.

The bill includes a change Peltola has advocated for in November, when she came to the committee as a hearing witness: adding two seats on the North Pacific Fisheries Management Council for Alaska tribal members.

Without those seats at the table, she argues, the fisheries management council will always be more receptive to the large trawl fleet. They catch salmon by accident. Peltola said this bycatch is one reason the fish don’t return to the rivers like the used to.

Read the full article at Alaska Public Media

Alaska Democrat’s arrival signals change in fisheries debate

September 19, 2022 — As the first Alaska native elected to Congress, Democratic Rep. Mary Peltola will bring a new twist to a long-running fisheries debate when the House Natural Resources Committee votes on a proposed overhaul of the nation’s premier fishing law this week.

It’s a top issue for Peltola, who was sworn in last week and promptly won a seat on the committee.

It’s also an issue that Peltola knows well, having served as director of the Kuskokwim River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission and getting a very early start on fishing herself.

Read the full article at E&E News

ALASKA: Peltola lands a spot on House Resources. Next up: the Magnuson-Stevens fisheries bill

September 19, 2022 — New Alaska Congresswoman Mary Peltola was awarded a seat on the House Natural Resources Committee, where Chairman Raúl Grijalva said she will sometimes be at odds with her fellow Democrats.

“I think she brings a perspective – and it’s not just an Alaska Native perspective, it’s an Alaska perspective – to us,” said Grijalva, D-Ariz.

The Resources Committee considers issues of huge importance to Alaska: Oil development. Oceans and fisheries. Federal land management. Native Affairs. Peltola’s predecessor, the late Don Young, was on the committee for decades and used to be its chair.

Next week, the Resources Committee will take up a rewrite of the Magnuson-Stevens Act, the law governing fishing in federal waters. Before he died in March, Young was working on it with Rep. Jared Huffman, D-Calif.

Read the full article at KTOO

Federal survey delivers more bad news to the Bering Sea crab fleet

September 12, 2022 — A Bering Sea survey by federal scientists contains more bad news for Alaska, Washington and Oregon-based crabbers hoping for an upturn in upcoming harvests that last year fell to rock-bottom levels.

The federal survey results for Bristol Bay king crab are bleak and crabbers have been warned that — for a second consecutive year — there may not be a fall harvest, according to Jamie Goen, executive director of the Alaska Bering Sea Crabbers.

The new survey results, released late last week, show that the population of mature male snow crab targeted by crabbers decreased by 22% from 2021, which at 5.6 million pounds was at the lowest level in more than 40 years. The snow crab population crashed amid a Bering Sea warming, and the new survey results are likely to result in an even smaller harvest for the upcoming winter season.

Alaska, within the limits of a federal management plan, determines how many crabs can be caught based on these surveys, as well as analysis by state and federal scientists. When more crabs are found in these surveys, the harvest levels generally climb. When the surveys indicate crab populations are in decline, the managers typically slash the quotas to give the populations a better chance to rebound. And, when the numbers fall too low, the harvests may be shut down.

As recently as 2016, the Bering Sea crab harvests grossed more than $280 million for a fleet that uses baited steel-framed traps — called pots — along the bottom of the ocean.

Snow crab and king crab historically have been the biggest-dollar harvests for Bering sea crabbers, some of whom also pursue smaller populations of other species. And the harvest cuts expected this year will put some fishermen who have big debt loads at risk of financial disaster, Goen said.

“We have got an emergency,” Goen said. “I’m trying to get Congress to act to help.”

The National Marine Fisheries Service survey does offer hope for improved harvests three to five years from now, as young snow crabs grow to adult size.

“The positive news is that we saw a significant increase in immature snow crab abundance, both males and females,” said Mike Litzow, survey lead and director of the Alaska Fisheries Science Center’s Kodiak Laboratory. “Depending on how many of these young crabs actually survive to adulthood, this could be one bright spot for the fishing industry in a few years.”

Read the full article at the Anchorage Daily News

Chinook lawsuit still looms over Alaska trollers

September 7, 2022 –A lawsuit filed against National Marine Fisheries Service in 2020 reared its head in a Washington district court on Aug. 8, and it could spell changes in fisheries management for Southeast Alaska trollers.

The case stems from a suit brought by the Wild Fish Conservancy that challenges the biological rationale in setting allocations of Pacific Salmon Treaty chinooks that Southeast trollers catch.

The premise of the case is that NMFS, in its biological opinion, did not consider a portion of the commingling stocks as forage fish for a pod of 74 killer whales in Puget Sound, rendering the agency out of compliance with the Endangered Species Act.

Like other legal battles between the fishing industry and environmental groups, this case stems from differing interpretations of the data.

The Wild Fish Conservancy contends that 97 percent of the troll-caught chinooks originate in drainages outside of Alaska. The Alaska Department of Fish and Game, meanwhile, estimates those numbers between 30 and 80 percent, and that the percentages vary each year.

Though some feared that a subsequent injunction filed by the conservancy could stop the fishery after the initial case was filed in 2020, that didn’t happen.

Read the full article at the National Fisherman

Green crabs have already invaded Washington’s shorelines. Now they’re heading to Alaska.

September 7, 2022 — The first signs of the Alaskan invasion were discovered by an intern.

In July, a young woman walking the shoreline of the Metlakatla Indian Community during an internship with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration found a shell of a known menace in the U.S. — the European green crab.

Two more were soon discovered. It was a day many had been dreading for years.

“We always knew we were eventually going to see evidence of green crab,” said Dustin Winter, a member of the Metlakatla Indian Community and the program director of its fish and wildlife department. “I didn’t think it was going to happen so quickly.”

Within a month and half, more than 80 live green crabs had been trapped along the Metlakatla shoreline, Winter said, making the community ground zero in the fight against the species in Alaska, though it’s possible other areas of Alaska have been colonized already.

The green crab is a notorious invasive species that has reshaped U.S. ecosystems and hammered East Coast commercial fisheries for decades. The discovery of the species in Alaska represents a profound risk in a state that accounts for about 60% of the nation’s seafood harvest.

They’re also almost impossible to remove. Nowhere in the world have green crabs been eradicated after they’ve established a population, scientists say. The discovery, which experts say is likely tied to warming waters due to climate change, threatens Alaskan economies, ecosystems and longstanding ways of life.

Read the full article at NBC News

NFI Submits Comments in Support of EPA Clean Water Act Proposed Determination Regarding Pebble Mine

September 7, 2022 –The National Fisheries Institute (NFI) submitted comments on Tuesday supporting the EPA’s updated Proposed Determination to veto development of the Pebble Limited Partnership’s 2020 Mine Plan.

According to NFI, if finalized the EPA’s Determination would protect the Bristol Bay watersheds and rivers that support the world’s largest and most economically valuable sockeye salmon fishery. Most recently the harvest accounted for 57% of the world’s sustainable wild salmon harvest. Estimates also suggest that the Bristol Bay sockeye fishery provides over 15,000 jobs and generates roughly $2 billion in annual economic activity.

NFI’s comments were sent to EPA Administrator Michael S. Regan and Regional Administrator Casey Sixkiller. The comments can be read in their entirety below:

The National Fisheries Institute (“NFI”) submits these comments to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (“EPA”), with respect to the EPA Clean Water Act (“CWA”) Section 404(c) Proposed Determination to prohibit and restrict the use of certain waters in the Bristol Bay watershed as disposal sites for the discharge of dredged or filled material associated with the Pebble Deposit.

NFI supports EPA’s updated, Proposed Determination to veto development of the Pebble Limited Partnership’s 2020 Mine Plan. If finalized, EPA’s Determination would protect the Bristol Bay watersheds and rivers that support the world’s largest and most economically and ecologically valuable sockeye salmon fishery, a fishery that in the most recent harvest accounted for 57 percent of the world’s sustainable wild salmon harvest. The Pebble Mine project poses a significant threat to the Bristol Bay fishery. The project as proposed by the Pebble Limited Partnership (“PLP”) should not proceed.

Read the full article at Seafoodnews.com

ALASKA: Scientists use genetics to track Alaska salmon bycatch

September 1, 2022 — Salmon stocks from up and down the Pacific coast congregate in the Gulf of Alaska and the Bering Sea to feed.

That’s also where trawlers go to harvest millions of pounds of pollock and other groundfish. And those trawlers often accidentally scoop up salmon and other fish in their nets, too — a problem known as bycatch.

Scientists with NOAA Fisheries, which oversees federal fisheries in those waters, want to understand where the bycatch is coming from — and where those fish would return to — so that they can understand the impacts of bycatch on specific stocks. That’s especially true for stocks in western Alaska, an area of the state that is seeing dismal salmon returns.

“100 percent, that’s our focus for chum, given its overweighted importance to subsistence fisheries,” said Wes Larson, a fisheries geneticist with NOAA Fisheries.

Read the full article at Alaska Public Media

At-sea Processors Association Celebrates Landmark FISH Crew Certification of its Catcher-Processor Fleet

August 25, 2022 — The following was released by the At-sea Processors Association:

At-sea Processors Association (APA) announce today its catcher-processor fleet has been certified using the FISH Standard for Crew, an independent third-party certification program for labor practices on fishing vessels. The certification covers 14 catcher-processor vessels operating in the Alaska pollock and Pacific hake fisheries, which annually provide product for billions of seafood meals enjoyed by American and global consumers.

“Our employees are at the core of our operations,” said Jim Johnson, who serves as APA President and is also President & CEO of Glacier Fish Company, one of APA’s five members. “It is incumbent on all of us to ensure that crew members are treated with the utmost fairness at every stage of the recruitment and employment process. We are proud to have voluntarily committed to this additional layer of scrutiny, which should give buyers and consumers continued confidence that we are doing right by the men and women who produce our seafood.”

The exhaustive audit process included inspection of vessels; private interviews with crews; review of company recruitment practices, pay records and grievance logs; examination of safety protocols; and scrutiny of many other aspects of catcher-processor vessel operations relating to crew welfare.

“APA members have long-standing commitments to safety and responsible treatment of crews, and now their catcher-processor vessels are independently confirmed to be operating in accordance with rigorous crew welfare standards,” said Stephanie Madsen, APA’s Executive Director. “There is a lot of momentum right now—from governments, industry, and civil society—to address instances of unethical treatment of workers in global supply chains. We believe the FISH Standard for Crew can be one important tool in those efforts as they relate to seafood. Through this certification, we are proud to be helping raise the bar on what should be expected globally from those who operate fishing vessels.”

The certified APA vessels are operated by American Seafoods, Arctic Storm, Coastal Villages, Glacier Fish, and  Trident Seafoods.

The At-sea Processors Association is a trade association representing five member companies that own U.S.-flag catcher-processor vessels operating in the Bering Sea / Aleutian Islands Alaska pollock fishery. This abundant and well-managed fishery provides product for billions of seafood meals every year, more than any other fishery on Earth.

OPINION: Alaska’s CDQ fishery program is too important to be misunderstood

August 24, 2022 — Fish politics run deep with Alaskans, and many of us have strong opinions about fisheries management issues. However, the Aug. 4 commentary appearing in this newspaper from Mike Heimbuch, a sitting member of the Board of Fish (BOF), was simply misinformed. We write to not only set the record straight, but also to make sure his conclusions about fish user groups not prejudge the opinions of the ADN’s readers or other Board of Fish members.

Particularly striking were his mischaracterizations about the Community Development Quota (CDQ) Program, a program whose constituents often come before the BOF and who deserve a fair and impartial forum to advocate for the interests of the 65 Western Alaska CDQ communities. First, they are not Alaska Native corporations. They are Alaska nonprofit economic development corporations whose purpose is to provide economic opportunity, jobs, scholarships and training to its 30,000 Western Alaska residents.

The CDQ program has been in existence since 1992 and is arguably the most successful joint state-federal program in Alaska’s history. The six CDQ groups are estimated to be responsible for approximately 20% of their region’s total employment, with more than $40 million in annual wages to their residents, and more than 1,600 students per year are awarded scholarships. The CDQ groups support millions of dollars in infrastructure grants and funding in Western Alaska to support essential needs like fuel purchases. They are not widely known because they focus their resources and efforts where they matter most, in remote communities like Stebbins, Kwinhagak, Levelock, Atka, St. Paul and Nunam Iqua.

Read the full story at the Anchorage Daily News