February 13, 2017 — SEAFOOD NEWS — The Alaska halibut fishery has been awarded continued certification to the Alaska Responsible Fisheries Management (RFM) Certification Program. Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute (ASMI) announce the finding late last week.

This is the first reassessment of Alaska halibut under Alaska’s RFM program, after initially being certified in April 2011. The fishery is also certified by the Marine Stewardship Council’s program. The fishery client is the Fishing Vessel Owners Association, based in Seattle.

In the more than 125 management standards used in RFM sustainability certification, the Alaska halibut fishery received highest marks in all but one: observer coverage. Although National Marine Fisheries Service changed the federal observer program to include the halibut longline fleet in 2013, the new plan, which was paid for by the halibut industry, was fraught with problems. Many longline vessels cannot support an additional observer onboard without significant impact on their crew size and efficiency, so have preferred electronic monitoring (EM) as an alternative data and observation source.

The assessment report includes details for what it describes as a “minor” non-conformance.

“For 2016, 58 fixed-gear vessels 40-57.5 ft LOA will [sic] participate in the EM selection pool and will carry EM systems as described in the EM Plan. The Observer Program Annual Report (NMFS 2015a) and the Observer Program Supplement Environmental Assessment (NMFS 2015b) have highlighted the data gaps caused by not having any observer information on vessels less than 40 ft LOA. In 2014, vessels less than 40 ft took about 20% (in value) of the longline halibut catch in Alaska (Fissel et al. 2015). NMFS recommended in its 2016 Deployment Plan138 that vessels less than 40ft LOA be considered for electronic monitoring in the future, and there are plans to partially implement EM in this sector in 2017.”

Details of the assessment can be found in the Final Assessment Report.

For more information on Alaska RFM certification, visit here.

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