Saving Seafood

EDF on AL.com Article: We’re Proud of Our Work to Reform Fisheries

October 7, 2016 — The following was released by the Environmental Defense Fund in response to an earlier article published at Al.com:

A lengthy article published this week on AL.com seriously misrepresents the work of Environmental Defense Fund to advance fishery management reforms. Matt Tinning, Senior Director U.S. Oceans Program, released the following response:

“For the second time this year, AL.com has published a sloppy, inaccurate and inflammatory opinion piece about U.S. fisheries masquerading as investigative reporting. The writer’s primary focus is the Gulf of Mexico.

“AL.com, which gave EDF no opportunity to respond to many of the allegations leveled in their article, is failing its readers by presenting a distorted and factually-flawed picture of how Gulf fisheries are managed.

“Fisheries management is complex, and every decision involves difficult trade-offs based on a web of competing considerations about sustainability, access and societal impacts. In the Gulf of Mexico, EDF has worked with commercial fishermen, seafood buyers, recreational anglers, and government authorities for the last 15 years to help navigate these complex issues. We’ve done so with the singular focus of overcoming the profound management failures of the past and restoring fisheries to health for the benefit of the Gulf of Mexico’s coastal communities now and for future generations.

“We’re incredibly proud of what we’ve helped achieve. When we started, fishermen in the Gulf of Mexico were stuck under failing management that had perpetuated overfishing and reduced the population of Gulf red snapper to four percent of its historic level. Commercial fishermen worked in a derby fishery that forced them to fish in ever-shorter seasons. They often had to fish in dangerous weather and could not develop regular markets with buyers who needed more even supply.

“The new commercial management system known as an individual fishing quota (IFQ), which went on the water in 2007, has transformed the fishery. The initial allocation of quota was based on catch history, and a six percent consolidation cap was included to prevent concentration of quota in the hands of any one participant. The AL.com piece presents faulty numbers to make the false claim that some participants own much higher percentages. EDF believes that well designed fisheries management systems can prevent concentration. The claim that we favor ‘privatization’ of the resource is preposterous.

“Today, revenues for fishermen have doubled and the population of red snapper has tripled. In contrast with the pre-IFQ system, new entrants join the fishery every year, and many commercial fishermen are leading the way on innovations making the fishery even more sustainable. Restaurants, groceries stores and other seafood buyers are strong supporters of the commercial IFQ because it allows them to provide delicious, sustainable and local seafood (which they often struggled to obtain before 2007) to millions of customers.

“The Gulf of Mexico’s recreational anglers – many of whom had simply stopped targeting red snapper before 2007 because population decline had made them so hard to find – have seen their total allowable catch more than double. However, in contrast with commercial fishermen, they remain stuck under a failing management system that uses crude and outdated tools such as season limits. Many anglers are working to find better approaches. By using modern technologies like real-time tablet reporting to count every fish that they catch, headboats and charter captains can avoid the crippling economic consequences of short seasons and fish when customer demand is high.

“We’re proud to support these vital coastal small-businesses in their efforts to reform a failing system. And as private anglers consider what lessons they can learn from other wildlife management contexts (such as the rules embraced by hunters and freshwater fishermen) as an alternative to frustratingly short recreational seasons, we stand ready to assist.

“We look forward to being given space on AL.com’s website soon to respond in detail. Until then, we’ll proudly continue our work in the Gulf of Mexico and elsewhere to improve the health of the oceans and the livelihoods of America’s fishermen.”

See the full post here

AP: Conservationists keep pressing for Atlantic Ocean monuments

July 11, 2016 — The following is excerpted from a story published today by the Associated Press. In it, representatives of the Pew Charitable Trusts and the Conservation Law Foundation (CLF) call for President Obama to use executive authority under the Antiquities Act to designate multiple national marine monuments off the coast of New England.

Last month, eight members of the National Coalition for Fishing Communities (NCFC) and the valuable fishing port of New Bedford, Mass., united in opposition to proposed Atlantic monuments. The groups agreed that fishing areas and resources should continue to be managed in the open and transparent manner stipulated by the Magnuson-Stevens Act (MSA).

Previously, many of the environmental groups calling for Atlantic monuments expressed support for fisheries management under the MSA. In December, Pew called the MSA “the bedrock of one of the world’s best fishery management systems.” In April, the CLF wrote that the MSA is “the primary reason why the United States can say that it has the most sustainable fisheries in the world.” In February, the Environmental Defense Fund said that the MSA “has made the United States a global model for sustainable fisheries management.”

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — Environmental conservationists aren’t giving up on trying to persuade the White House to designate an area in the Gulf of Maine as a national monument.

In the final months of President Barack Obama’s term, they’re hoping he’ll protect an underwater mountain and offshore ecosystem in the Gulf of Maine known as Cashes Ledge. They also want him to protect a chain of undersea formations about 150 miles off the coast of Massachusetts known as the New England Coral Canyons and Seamounts.

The White House Council on Environmental Quality said in March, and reiterated last week, that while the New England Coral Canyons and Seamounts area is under consideration, Cashes Ledge currently is not. There are no marine national monuments in the Atlantic Ocean.

Robert Vanasse, executive director of the fishing advocacy group Saving Seafood, said environmental groups seemed to be “in denial and shock” after the White House first said it wasn’t considering Cashes Ledge in March.

“I think they overplayed their hand. They arrogantly seemed to think that they could dictate to the White House,” he said on Wednesday.

Vanasse said fishing interests are now taking the White House at its word that Cashes Ledge is off the table. The industry is already struggling with quota cuts and climate change.

Commercial fishing groups oppose creating any marine monument in the Atlantic under the American Antiquities Act because the decision is left entirely to the president, Vanasse said. There are existing procedures to protect areas where the public participates in the process under the top law regulating fishing in U.S. oceans, the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act, he added.

“We’re not the fringe nutcases here,” Vanasse said. “It’s pretty much every non-environmentally subsidized fishery organization that is opposed to the use of the Antiquities Act to create marine monuments. The Magnuson-Stevens process works. It could be better, but it’s working.”

Read the full story from the Associated Press at the Boston Herald

On Facebook, EDF Attributes “Amazing Comeback of U.S. Fisheries” to Catch Shares

December 29, 2015 (Saving Seafood) — Yesterday, in a Facebook post, the Environmental Defense Fund attributed the “amazing comeback” of U.S. fisheries to the implementation of catch shares, stating “There’s a boatload of evidence (pun very much intended) that this approach is working.”

According to EDF:

“Just a decade ago, many commercial fisheries were something of a free for all, with little incentive to do anything but fish first, fish fast, and fish until there was nothing left. Risky for fishermen and detrimental to species abundance, this system too often corroded the health of fishing communities and fish populations alike. Since then, an alternative management approach called catch shares has transformed this dynamic in many domestic fisheries by aligning the economic interests of fishermen with long-term conservation outcomes.”

Northeastern fishermen and fishing families with Facebook accounts who would like to comment, and let EDF know what catch shares have meant to them, can access the post here.