Saving Seafood

GOP senator: Arctic Ocean may be ice-free in summer within 20 years

December 7th, 2018 — Sen. Dan Sullivan (R-Alaska) on Thursday said the U.S. must prepare for an Arctic Ocean that is ice-free in the summer months within the next 20 years.

Sullivan, speaking at a hearing for the Senate Commerce Subcommittee on Oceans, Atmosphere, Fisheries, and Coast Guard, which he chairs, pointed to data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration indicating that as of 2011, Arctic sea ice was “42 percent thinner than it was in 1979.”

“If this trend continues, the Arctic Ocean may be ice-free during the summer months within the next 20 years,” he said.

Read the full story at The Hill

Trump signs Coast Guard bill into law, includes Jones Act waiver for America’s Finest

December 6, 2018 — When Dakota Creek Industries took America’s Finest out for its first sea trial on Tuesday 4 December, it looked like the 264-foot vessel was taking a victory lap.

The Anacortes, Washington-based shipbuilder held an event that day to celebrate the Jones Act waiver elected officials were able to get for the processor-trawler. Later in the day, U.S. President Donald Trump signed the Coast Guard Authorization Act, which contained the labor provision, into law.

The process itself is not quite finished. The Coast Guard will get 30 days to review information to make sure neither Dakota Creek nor Fishermen’s Finest – the company that commissioned construction of the USD 75 million (EUR 65.9 million) vessel – committed a deliberate violation of the Jones Act in building the ship.

Coast Guard officials did not return a request for comment.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

NOAA Announces Another Buyout for Southeast Alaska Purse Seiners to Remove an Additional 36 Licenses

December 5, 2018 — SEAFOOD NEWS — NOAA announced that a second buyout would take place in the Southeast Alaska salmon purse seine fishery.

In 2011, Congress approved loans of up to $23.5 million for a buyout program, and existing permit holders voted to support a loan of $13.1 million to buyback 64 licenses.

In 2018, the Southeast Revitalization Association submitted a request to NOAA to use the remainder of the funds, $10.4 million, to fund another buyout round.

NOAA will hold a referendum among the 315 existing permit holders, who will have to gain majority approval to take on the additional loan.  If the plan is approved, NOAA would retire an additional 36 licenses.

Those remaining in the fishery agree to repay the loan through a landings tax, administered by NOAA.

The voting period is scheduled to begin January 15, 2019, and end 30 days later on February 14th.

The Southeast Alaska purse seine fishery harvests primarily pink salmon and some chum salmon.

This story was originally published on SeafoodNews.com, a subscription site. It is reprinted with permission.

 

Bleak outlook for Pacific cod could see 2019 US pollock TAC hike, despite reduced biomass

December 5, 2018 — Although the biomass for pollock in the US eastern Bering Sea fishery is coming down, the total allowable catch (TAC) for 2019 could actually be increased, due to the outlook for further cuts to Pacific cod.

The TACs for pollock and cod, especially in light of the gloomy outlook for the latter, will be a major focus of the North Pacific Fishery Management Council (NPFMC) meeting in Anchorage, Alaska, this week, which will go ahead, after an earthquake hit the city last Friday. With whitefish prices set high, the Barents Sea cod and haddock fisheries coming down for 2019 and the Russians only increasing their pollock quota for next year marginally, industry players globally are looking to what happens at the meeting.

First, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) scientists present their views on the outlook for 2019, then the council will decide on TAC levels for pollock, cod, yellowfin sole and other fish. There is uncertainty around pollock and cod moving further north, as previously reported by Undercurrent News. 

Read the full story at Undercurrent News

British Columbia seeks bids for cleanup of mine polluting Alaska waters

December 5, 2018 — British Columbia mining regulators have taken the first step toward paying to clean up an abandoned mine that has been leaking acid runoff into Alaska waters for decades.

The British Columbia Ministry of Energy, Mines and Petroleum Resources issued a request for proposals Nov. 6 soliciting bids to remediate the Tulsequah Chief mine in the Taku River drainage about 10 miles upstream from the Alaska-British Columbia border.

State officials contend the multi-metal mine that operated for just six years has been leaking acid wastewater into the Tulsequah River, which feeds the Taku, since it was closed in 1957.

The Taku River empties into the Pacific near Juneau and is one of the largest salmon-bearing rivers in Southeast Alaska.

The Alaska congressional delegation and former Gov. Bill Walker’s administration have stepped up their demands for provincial officials to address the situation in recent years — largely at the behest of Southeast commercial fishing and Native groups — after the mine’s latest owners, Toronto-based Chieftain Metals Ltd., began bankruptcy proceedings in 2016.

Sen. Dan Sullivan and former Lt. Gov. Byron Mallott traveled to Ottawa to meet with Canadian officials in February to discuss their environmental and fishery concerns about government oversight of mining activity within transboundary watersheds in the province that flow into Alaska.

A burst of mining activity in the remote northern region of the province has led to numerous new mines and mine proposals in transboundary watersheds.

At the same time, the Energy, Mines and Petroleum Ministry has come under scrutiny for its regulatory requirements of mines after a British Columbia auditor general report concluded the 2014 Mount Polley mine tailings dam breach was the result of inadequate engineering.

The Mount Polley copper and gold mine is in the upper reaches of the large Fraser River watershed.

Alaska officials have also requested their provincial counterparts assist in conducting baseline environmental studies in the lower reaches of transboundary watersheds to monitor things such as water quality in advance of upstream mine development.

Sullivan said in a Nov. 19 statement from his office that he is encouraged the provincial government has finally taken a more active role in cleaning up the troubled and abandoned mine.

“The announcement that the government intends to move forward and develop a remediation plan is a step in the right direction. As voices on both sides of the border have been asking for years, it’s time for the B.C. government, the state of Alaska, Alaska Native and First Nations communities to work together to remove this and other looming threats over our rivers, fisheries, communities’ health and wellbeing,” Sullivan said.

Read the full story at the Anchorage Daily News

ALASKA: Commission staff reports on decrease in halibut

November 30, 2018 — Managers of halibut in the Pacific Ocean are reporting another year of declining stocks in most areas of the coast. The International Pacific Halibut Commission oversees management of the fish along the coast from Alaska to California. The commission held its interim meeting Tuesday and Wednesday, November 27-28 in Seattle and heard about the latest stock assessment of the valuable flatfish.

IPHC scientists do annual survey fishing to come up with the stock assessment, along with information from commercial catches and other fisheries along the coast.

“We estimate that the stock went down until somewhere around 2010 from historical highs in the late 1990s,” said Ian Stewart a quantitative scientist with the commission. “It increased slightly over the subsequent five year period and around 2015 or 2016, the stock leveled out and has been decreasing in spawning biomass slowly since that time period.”

Spawning biomass is the estimated total weight of fish that are old enough to reproduce. The commission’s annual survey showed the numbers of halibut coast-wide dropped by six percent from year before. The estimated weight of fish legal to catch in the commercial fishery dropped by 19 percent from the year before in Southeast area 2C and three percent in 3A, the central gulf.

The commission has been expanding its survey up and down the coast. New survey points were added in Southeast Alaska and British Columbia in 2018.

Stewart told commissioners that there’s a high probability that halibut stocks will continue to drop at the current level of fishing because of less productive years for the fish between 2006 and 2010.

Read the full story at KFSK

ALASKA: Poor pink runs forecast again; return to ‘normal’ in Bristol Bay

November 29, 2018 — Next summer may be a slow one for Southeast and Bristol Bay salmon fishermen.

The Alaska Department of Fish and Game’s annual salmon forecasts for the Southeast and Bristol Bay regions predict weaker runs for the 2019 season. In Southeast’s case, it’s the pink salmon predicted to come up short compared to recent averages; in Bristol Bay, it’s the sockeye.

About 18 million pink salmon are predicted to be harvested in Southeast Alaska in 2019, placing the run in the weak range, or between 20 percent and 40 percent of the 59-year average in the history of the fishery. The forecasted number is about half the recent 10-year average of 36 million pinks, according to the ADFG forecast. If the forecast holds true, it will be the lowest odd-year harvest since 1987.

The low number of juveniles in 2018 was unexpected, as the previous year’s escapements met goals.

“This indicates that brood year 2017 pink salmon likely experienced poor freshwater and/or early marine survival,” according to the forecast.

Read the full story at the Alaska Journal of Commerce

Food chain disruption eyed in Hawaii whale sighting decline

November 29, 2018 — Research into the decline of humpback whale sightings in Hawaii points to a food chain disruption likely caused by warmer ocean temperatures in the whales’ feeding grounds in Alaska, federal officials have said.

U.S. and international researchers, wildlife managers and federal officials were meeting in Honolulu on Tuesday and Wednesday to discuss the decline in sightings of humpbacks that traditionally migrate each autumn from Alaska, where they feed during the summer months, to Hawaii, where they mate and give birth during the winter.

Data presented at the meetings shows a strong correlation between warming oceans and the missing whales, said Christine Gabriele, a federal wildlife biologist who monitors humpbacks at Glacier Bay National Park in Alaska.

Three factors have warmed the ocean in Alaska since 2014, the same year scientists noticed a decline in sightings in Hawaii.

There was a change in an ocean current known as the Pacific Decadal Oscillation, a warm El Nino period in 2016, and a massive “blob” of warm water in the region.

The Pacific Decadal Oscillation, a current that switches between cool and warm periods over the course of many years, switched to warm in 2014.

Data shows that “it was more favorable for the whales when we were in a cold period, and then less favorable when the (Pacific Decadal Oscillation) switches to warm,” Gabriele said.

Read the full story at The Hawaii Tribune Herald

House passes US Coast Guard bill with Jones Act exemption for America’s Finest

November 29, 2018 — The US House of Representatives has passed a US Coast Guard reauthorization bill that includes provisions allowing Alaska’s Amendment 80 fleet to finally gain the use of one of its newest vessels while also protecting shrimpers in the Gulf of Mexico from being fined by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for cleaning off their decks.

The Frank LoBiondo Coast Guard Authorization Act of 2018, S. 140, was passed by a unanimous voice vote late Tuesday, moving the two-year, $10 billion bill named after a retiring New Jersey congressman to president Donald Trump’s desk for a signature. The action happened with just a few weeks to spare in the 115th Congress.

The legislation passed the US Senate back on Nov. 14 by a 94-6 tally, as reported by Undercurrent News.

Included in S. 140 is a long-anticipated Jones Act waiver for America’s Finest, a 264-foot catcher-processor built by Dakota Creek Industries in Anacortes, Washington, for Kirkland, Washington-based Fishermen’s Finest at a cost of about $75 million. More than 7% of the ship’s hull contains steel from the Netherlands, which violates the Jones Act requirement that US fishing vessels be made of no more than 1.5% foreign steel.

The provision, which allows Fishermen’s Finest to use the vessel to replace American No. 1, a 39-year-old, 160-foot vessel, was fought for by senator Maria Cantwell and representative Rick Larsen, both Washington state Democrats, with cooperation from senator Dan Sullivan and representative Don Young, both Alaska Republicans

Read the full story at Undercurrent News

As oceans heats up off Northwest Alaska, the fishing does too

November 28, 2018 — Alaska fishermen haven’t been having an easy time with the changing climate.

The cod population in the Gulf of Alaska is at its lowest level on record. Officials have declared disasters after the failure of multiple Alaska salmon fisheries.

So what’s happening farther north in Alaska might surprise you: Fishermen there have been landing huge catches, in numbers that haven’t been seen in decades.

Seth Kantner is one of them. He was raised in a sod igloo 150 miles from the Northwest Alaska hub town of Kotzebue, and has been commercial fishing for chum salmon in Kotzebue Sound for decades.

He’s also a writer, and in an interview from his pickup truck looking out over the sound, he said he’s a little apprehensive about some of the changes he’s been seeing in the region — particularly in the weather and the seasons.

Some of those changes, Kantner said, have fed into the fishing, which has been booming. In the summer of 2017, he fished to the last day of the season to try to hit 100,000 pounds of salmon for the year, which he said is “far and away the most I’d ever caught.”

This past summer, he added: “I broke 200,000 pounds, which is still — I can’t believe it.”

Just to be clear — Kantner said that two summers ago, he caught more fish than he’d ever caught before. And then this summer, he caught twice that much again.

Read the full story at Alaska Public Media