Saving Seafood

ALASKA: From Sea to Community, The Evolution of Alaska’s Community Development Quota Program

February 19, 2025 — For almost 50 years, the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act has governed sustainable fisheries all around the United States. It supports 1.6 million jobs and tens of thousands of small businesses. It also supports one of the most enduring and effective economic opportunity programs in America, the Western Alaska Community Development Quota program, or CDQ.

The Fishery Conservation and Management Act of 1976, as Magnuson-Stevens was originally known, is known globally for creating the “exclusive economic zone,” which gave the United States control of natural resources from 3 miles (the end of state waters) out to 200 miles from its shores. The law evicted foreign fishing fleets from the bountiful fishing grounds of the Bering Sea, reserving it for a small but growing fleet of American fishing vessels. The Act also directs that local stakeholders appointed to regional fishery management councils decide how the fisheries should operate. Their decisions are made within firm statutory guardrails that mandate sustainability, minimize bycatch, and protect fishing communities.

America’s Bering Sea fleet was originally based in, and owned by, Seattle companies. When Congress updated Magnuson-Stevens in 1996, Alaska Senator Ted Stevens added the CDQ program into federal law, setting up a mechanism that would slowly shift ownership of the fleet from Seattle to Alaska. CDQ began at the North Pacific Fishery Management Council in 1992, the brainchild of western Alaska advocates who saw that most Bering Sea communities did not have an economic stake in the Bering Sea. The program sets aside ten percent of the fish harvests for a small percentage of the pollock harvest for 65 Bering Sea communities, most of which are majority Alaska Native. The communities are grouped into six regional non-profit entities. These “CDQ groups” harvest the fish on their own vessels or sell the harvest rights to fishing companies, then use the revenues to invest in the Bering Sea industry and fund economic development in one of America’s poorest regions: coastal western Alaska.

Read the full article at the Wilson Center

ALASKA: Alaska’s salmon fishery passes MSC audits, marking 25 years of certification

February 18, 2025 — The Alaskan salmon fishery has met all Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) standard requirements related to its hatcheries after a recent audit, allowing it to continue possessing its certification.

MRAG Americas, an independent assessment body, determined Alaska’s salmon fishery met the MSC’s hatchery management standards, which include comprehensive marking of hatchery-produced salmon to track the origin of fish to certain hatcheries. The tracking is designed to allow fishery managers to assess and regulate fishery contributions and interactions between hatchery salmon and wild salmon.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

USDA sends out second-largest pollock bid invitation ever; offers due by late February

February 18, 2025 — The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is asking seafood suppliers to bid on significant quantities of domestic pollock, shrimp, and catfish.

The agency is asking for bids on more than 21 million pounds of Alaska pollock fillets, nuggets, and sticks for household food distribution through food banks. Offers are due by 27 February for deliveries that will be made between April and June 2025.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

ALASKA: NPFMC adjusts proposals to reduce chum salmon bycatch by Alaskan pollock trawlers

February 18, 2025 — The North Pacific Fishery Management Council (NPFMC) has advanced a set of five alternatives for reducing chum salmon bycatch in the U.S. state of Alaska’s pollock fishery, setting up a vote on implementing new protections as soon as December 2025.

Chum salmon populations in Alaska have plummeted in recent years; in the Yukon River, for instance, the fall chum salmon run is 97 percent below its historical average. The low abundance levels have led to fishery closures and bans on subsistence fishing in parts of the state.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

ALASKA: Final federal decision on chum salmon bycatch slated for December

February 14, 2025 — In the wake of several days of lengthy testimony on chum salmon bycatch, a final decision for the issue is scheduled for the December North Pacific Fishery Management Council meeting in Anchorage.

In the interim, the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) is slated to publish its draft environmental impact statement on the matter in the Federal Register in August, allowing for 60 days of public comment to follow.

By the conclusion of the North Pacific Fishery Management Council meeting in Anchorage on Feb. 11, the body had amended some alternatives and was sending the analysis to NMFS for publication of the draft environmental impact statement.

Those changes included lowering a considered bycatch cap in some salmon corridors to 50,000 chum salmon, shortening the time frame by which they’ll take action, and also broadening the overall range of alternatives. The council did not indicate support of any specific alternative.

Read the full article at The Cordova Times

Alaska Salmon Fishery Closes Hatchery-Related Conditions on Marine Stewardship Council Certificate in Latest Audit

February 14, 2025 — The following was released by the Marine Stewardship Council:

The Alaska salmon fishery has successfully met all Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) Standard requirements related to hatcheries, according to a recent audit by independent assessment body MRAG Americas. This achievement was possible through dedicated efforts by the Alaska Fishery Development Foundation, the Alaska Department of Fish and Game’s (ADF&G) Commercial Fisheries Division and Alaska Private Non-Profit Hatchery Corporations and reinforces Alaska’s commitment to environmentally sustainable fishing under MSC certification.

A Legacy of Sustainability
Alaska has a long history of demonstrated success in sustainable management of wild salmon runs as a constitutionally mandated priority. Alaska salmon fisheries have been MSC-certified for 25 years, making them one of the longest-running certificate holders. Through annual audits and five-year recertifications, these fisheries consistently meet MSC’s globally recognized standards for sustainable fish stocks, ecosystem protection, and effective management. In November 2024, the fishery was recertified, marking a quarter-century of engagement in the MSC program.
Advancements in Hatchery Research & Management
In collaboration with the ADF&G, Alaska fisheries have implemented comprehensive marking of hatchery production salmon in order to track the origin of fish to certain hatcheries and to assess and regulate fishery contributions and hatchery-wild interactions. The MSC audit confirmed that Alaska’s hatchery management practices and strategies align with wild salmon conservation policies, ensuring long-term sustainability.
Science-Driven Conservation
The State of Alaska Hatchery Research Project, led by ADF&G and a panel of state, federal, and academic scientists, played a key role in evaluating hatchery-wild salmon interactions. The latest MSC audit reaffirmed that wild salmon populations continue to thrive, maintaining the necessary genetic integrity to remain productive into the future.
Global Market Trust
MSC certification provides third-party verification of sustainability, ensuring continued access to key global markets that require rigorous environmental standards. This milestone highlights the cooperative efforts of Alaska’s salmon fisheries and ADF&G to uphold sustainable, science-based fisheries management.

ALASKA: Fishery managers start a process to tighten salmon bycatch rules in Alaska’s Bering Sea

February 13, 2025 — Federal fishery managers took steps on Tuesday to impose new rules to prevent Alaska chum salmon from being scooped into nets used to catch Bering Sea pollock, an industrial-scale fishery that makes up the nation’s largest single-species commercial seafood harvest.

The North Pacific Fishery Management Council advanced a suite of new protections intended to combat the pollock trawlers’ salmon bycatch, the term for the incidental catch of unintended species. Proposed steps in the package include numeric caps on total chum salmon bycatch, with varying allocations for different sectors of the pollock fleet; protective limits in corridors known to be used by salmon migrating through the ocean back to Western Alaska freshwater spawning areas; and provisions that would link new limits in the ocean to real-time salmon counts and conditions in the rivers.

The action followed years of complaints about ocean bycatch of chum salmon at a time when runs in Western Alaska rivers have dwindled, becoming so low at times that no fishing was allowed.

The council’s meeting in Anchorage, which started on Feb. 3 and wrapped up with the vote on Tuesday, was devoted almost exclusively to the problem of bycatch and its effects of chum salmon runs in the Yukon and Kuskokwim river systems.

The vote to advance the protective package followed days of sometimes-emotional testimony from residents of rural Western and Interior Alaska villages who have long depended on chum salmon – one of the five species of Pacific salmon – as a food staple.

Residents who testified described the anemic salmon runs as a crisis threatening family well-being, local economies and Indigenous cultures and identities.

Read the full article at Alaska Beacon

First Nation calls on Alaskan fishery to stop intercepting vulnerable salmon

February 13, 2025 — Tŝilhqot’in chiefs are calling on the Alaskan District 104 Fishery to stop intercepting vulnerable salmon stocks bound for their territory, stating the fishery’s harvesting is infringing on Tŝilhqot’in Aboriginal rights.

“Our people depend on the salmon run every year to ensure that our families do not go hungry,” Nits’ilʔin (Chief) Joe Alphonse said in a Feb. 11 press release issued by the Tŝilhqot’in National Government (TNG).

The chiefs are making their call at the Pacific Salmon Commission’s fortieth annual meeting in Portland, Ore. The commission works to implement the Pacific Salmon Treaty which authorizes the Alaskan Salmon Fishery.

Read the full article at The Hamilton Spector

ALASKA: King crab fishery approved in Southeast AK

February 13, 2025 — Crabbers in Southeast Alaska could soon be able to harvest red king crabs after the Alaska Board of Fisheries approved a proposal enabling regulators to open a small, limited commercial king crab fishery.

Previous regulations banned officials from opening a commercial king crab fishery in Southeast Alaska unless the estimated biomass of legal male red king crab exceeds 200,000 pounds. The requirement has made it nearly impossible for regulators to open a season in the region; Southeast Alaska has only authorized three commercial red king crab seasons over the last 20 years.

The Alaska Department of Fish & Game (ADF&G) and commercial fishers argue that the requirement was based on an outdated claim that it wasn’t financially viable for crab processors to open for anything less than a harvest based on that 200,000-pound threshold.

Read the full article at the National Fisherman

ALASKA: Alaska Board of Fisheries rejects hatchery production cuts

February 12, 2025 — A proposal to slash hatchery production of pink and chum salmon in Southeast Alaska was rejected by the Alaska Board of Fisheries over the weekend.

The measure, known as Proposal 156, aimed to cut hatchery egg takes by 25 percent but failed to gain majority support from the seven-member board, Intrafish reported.

The proposal sparked a heated debate, with commercial fishermen, sport fishing interests, and aquaculture advocates warning of the economic fallout. The Sitka Sound Science Center, which runs Alaska’s oldest salmon hatchery, was among those opposing the measure, citing its role in training and education.

Proponents of the reduction argued that hatchery-raised salmon creates too much competition in the ocean for food resources, potentially harming wild king salmon populations. With ongoing king salmon closures and growing user conflicts, some groups pushed for lower hatchery production as a precaution.

Read the full article at the National Fisherman