Saving Seafood

NOAA fines Carlos Rafael $3m, requires him to cease all fishing, give up permits

August 19, 2019 — The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has reached a settlement with Carlos Rafael that will see the incarcerated fishing mogul pay a $3 million civil fine, relinquish the dealer permit held by his Carlos Seafood business, permanently cease all groundfish and scallop fishing, and sell all federal fishing permits and fishing vessels he owns or controls by the end of next year.

NOAA said in a press release that 17 of Rafael’s former captains will receive suspensions of their operator permits ranging from 20 to 200 days and serve probationary periods of one to three years for their own violations of federal fishing rules.

According to the settlement, Rafael’s fleet must cease all groundfish fishing by Dec. 31, 2019, and end all scallop harvesting by March 31, 2020.

Read the full story at Undercurrent News

PFMC: Groundfish Management Team to Hold Work Session in Portland, OR October 7-11, 2019

August 15, 2019 — The following was released by the Pacific Fishery Management Council:

The Pacific Fishery Management Council’s Groundfish Management Team (GMT) will hold a week-long work session that is open to the public. The GMT meeting will be held Monday, October 7, 2019 from 1 p.m. until business for the day is completed.  The GMT meeting will reconvene Tuesday, October 8 through Friday, October 11 from 8:30 a.m. until business for each day has been completed.

Please see the GMT October 7-11, 2019 meeting notice on the Council’s website for full details.

For further information:

  • Please contact Pacific Fishery Management Council staff officer Todd Phillips  at 503-820-2426; toll-free 1-866-806-7204.

DAVID GOETHEL: 100% fishing monitoring is unnecessary

August 13, 2019 — I would like to correct some misconceptions and rebut some of the statements made by Ms. Johanna Thomas in her Aug. 2, 2019, opinion in the Seacoast Newspapers. Ms. Thomas sites the West coast Groundfish fleet as a success story. That is not the case as told by the fishermen on the West coast. She also fails to mention that 50% of the fleet was bought out in a $60 million-plus dollar buy out prior to the implementation of catch shares. This alone should have rebuilt stocks.

Ms. Thomas extolls the virtue of cameras on vessels but fails to point out that the fish must be placed, one at a time, on a measuring board in front of the camera which makes them just as dead as the at-sea monitoring program. She also fails to point out that this system is just as costly as at-sea monitoring but with one added detraction. Our vessels are our bathroom, bedroom and boardroom. The camera records everything and is a massive invasion of privacy and civil liberties. The city of Manchester, N.H. has been sued by the ACLU over this issue and courts in British Columbia ruled that fishermen could not be constantly recorded in the name of fishery management.

Read the full opinion piece at SeaCoast Online

PFMC: Groundfish Management Team to Hold Webinar September 26, 2019 (updated)

August 12, 2019 — The following was released by the Pacific Fishery Management Council:

The Pacific Fishery Management Council’s (Pacific Council) Groundfish Management Team (GMT) will convene a webinar meeting to discuss items harvest specifications and other items related to the GMT’s in-person meeting scheduled for October 7-11, 2019.  The webinar will be held Thursday, September 26, 2019 from 10 a.m. until 4 p.m. Pacific Daylight Time.  The webinar end time is an estimate, the meeting will adjourn when business for the day is completed.

Please see the GMT September 26, 2019 webinar notice on the Council’s website for participation details.

A public listening station will be provided at the Council office in Portland, Oregon.

For further information:

  • Please contact Pacific Fishery Management Council staff officer Todd Phillips  at 503-820-2426; toll-free 1-866-806-7204.

PFMC: Groundfish Management Team to Hold Webinar September 3, 2019

August 12, 2019 — The following was released by the Pacific Fishery Management Council:

The Pacific Fishery Management Council’s (Pacific Council) Groundfish Management Team (GMT) will convene a webinar meeting to discuss items on the Pacific Council’s September 2019 meeting agenda.  The webinar will be held Tuesday, September 3, 2019 from 1 p.m. until 4 p.m. Pacific Daylight Time.  The webinar end time is an estimate, the meeting will adjourn when business for the day is completed.

Please see the GMT September 3, 2019 webinar notice on the Council’s website for participation details.

A public listening station will be provided at the Council office in Portland, Oregon.

For further information:

  • Please contact Pacific Fishery Management Council staff officer Todd Phillips  at 503-820-2426; toll-free 1-866-806-7204.

Pacific Fishery Management Council to Hold Meeting In September 2019 to Adopt Management Measures for Ocean Fisheries

August 9th, 2019 — The following was published by the Pacific Fishery Management Council: 

The Pacific Fishery Management Council (Council) and its advisory bodies will meet September 11-18, 2019 in Boise, Idaho, to address issues related to groundfish, ecosystem, salmon, Pacific halibut, highly migratory species, habitat, and administrative matters. The meeting of the Council and its advisory entities will be held at the Riverside Hotel, 2900 Chinden Blvd., Boise, Idaho 83714; telephone, 208-343-1871.

Please see the September 11-18, 2019 Council Meeting notice on the Council’s website for meeting detail, schedule of advisory body meetings, our new E-Portal for submitting public comments, and public comment deadlines.

Key agenda items for the meeting include Council considerations to:

  • Adopt Final Rebuilding Plans for Strait of Juan de Fuca, Queets River, and Snohomish River Coho
  • Adopt a Final Preferred Alternative for Highly Migratory Species Deep-Set Buoy Gear Fishery Authorization
  • Adopt Public Review Options for Pacific Halibut 2020 Catch Sharing Plan Changes and Options for 2020 Directed Commercial Fishery Regulation Changes
  • Approve Final Groundfish Stock Assessments for 2021-2022 and Beyond
  • Adopt Initial Groundfish Harvest Specifications and a Preliminary List of Potential New Management Measures for the 2020-2021 Regulation Process
  • Adopt Final Groundfish In-season Adjustments and Consider Extending Midwater Trawl and Electronic Monitoring Exempted Fishing Permits into 2020
  • Adopt a Preliminary Preferred Alternative for Salmon Mitigation Measure in Groundfish Fisheries
  • Adopt Proposed Revisions to 2020 Harvest Specifications for Cowcod and Shortbelly Rockfish for Public Review
    For further information:

Please contact Pacific Fishery Management Council staff at 503-820-2280; toll-free 1-866-806-7204.

Pollock scarce — and expensive — as Northeast groundfish prices fluctuate

July 25, 2019 — The Northeast groundfish fishery kicked off May 1. The federal shutdown last winter meant some management changes, like Framework 58 which changes catch limits on several stocks, faced delays.

Groundfish prices seem to be fluctuating. Bert Jongerden, general manager of the Portland Fish Exchange, a wholesale auction in Maine says fleets are  “mostly bringing in Gulf of Maine haddock, dabs, and white hake, it’s balanced among those.”

Gulf of Maine haddock appears steady, with average price for large around $2.78 per pound. Demand for dabs for restaurant markets is high, with $4.50-5.00 for large dabs.

Fleets are hauling high volumes of redfish, with low prices. Another low point is monkfish.

“Tails are very soft, sometimes less than $1 per pound on auction,” adds Jongerden. It is a pattern that has been seen a few years – likely a result of robust supply but cold European markets, which set the price.

“A lot of gillnetters are targeting monks to avoid cod, because there is a terrible cod problem. The fish are there,” said Jongerden. Average prices for cod were $3.24 to $3.81 per pound as of late June.

All eyes are on Atlantic pollock. “Gillnetters are just not seeing them, no large or mediums,” adds Jongerden. Pollock (aka Boston bluefish) is popular in NY markets.

Read the full story at National Fisherman

PFMC: Scientific and Statistical Committee Groundfish Subcommittee to Meet in Seattle, WA August 20-21, 2019

July 25, 2019 — The following was released by the Pacific Fishery Management Council:

The Groundfish Subcommittee of the Pacific Fishery Management Council’s (Pacific Council’s) Scientific and Statistical Committee (SSC) will hold a public meeting to review new benchmark and update assessments and catch-only update assessment projections to inform new 2021 and 2022 groundfish harvest specifications.  This meeting will be held August 20-21, 2019 in Seattle, Washington.  This meeting will also occur via webinar.

Please see the SSC’s Groundfish Subcommittee August 20-21, 2019 meeting notice with webinar option on the Pacific Council’s website for participation details.

For further information:

  • Please contact Pacific Fishery Management Council staff officer Mr. John DeVore at 503-820-2413; toll-free 1-866-806-7204.

MASSACHUSETTS: Aging New Bedford fleet helped drive purchase of former copper mill property

July 24, 2019 — The logic behind the decision by Charlie and Michael Quinn, the father and son owners of Quinn Fisheries, to buy the former Revere Copper and Brass property in New Bedford, Massachusetts, was not unlike that of a physician specializing in geriatric care setting up an office somewhere in the state of Florida.

New Bedford has an aging population, too, though it’s the commercial fishing vessels in this case that are elderly.

Undercurrent News confirmed Monday that the Quinns, who have been in the scallop harvesting business since at least 1986, purchased the 14-acre property at 24 North Front Street after it sat idle for about a decade. They plan to convert it into a shipyard, both repairing existing commercial fishing vessels and barges and also building new ones, Michael Quinn, operations manager for the six-vessel commercial scallop harvesting company, told Undercurrent.

The Quinns should have plenty of ships to work with, confirms a review by Undercurrent of the port’s roster of 338 commercial vessels maintained on a database. More than half — 180 scallop and groundfish vessels (53%) — were built before 1980 and another 38 were built between 1980 and 1985.

“We’ve been trying to grow our business here for a while and we see a need so we did our due diligence and everything seems to make sense for us,” Michael Quinn told Undercurrent.

Read the full story at Undercurrent News

US groundfish fishery returning to its former glory, stakeholders say

July 22, 2019 — Last weekend’s Slow Food Nations Festival – a Denver, Colorado-based event showcasing sustainable and traceable food – was well represented by the U.S. West Coast groundfish fishery, which is exhibiting an impressive turnaround after it was decimated in the 1990’s.

The fishery, which consists predominantly of species of rockfish and flatfish, was collapsing due to overfishing about two decades ago. Thanks to conservation efforts, the recovery has been massively successful, with only two stocks down from the 10 classified as overfished. The two currently overfished groundfish stocks in the region are on the road to being rebuilt in coming years.

Even though the recovery of the fishery has been a smashing success thus far, demand for the fish has been languishing behind the supply, stakeholders say.

“The challenge at this point is that the economic performance is not coming up to where it’s being viewed as a profitable fishery by industry,” said Environmental Defense Fund Pacific Fisheries Policy Manager Melissa Mahoney. “That’s mainly because… when that fishery collapsed, [groundfish] lost their market share and at the same time, tilapia was coming in. So we’ve had the substitution of cheaper consistent whitefish in that market. As the fishery has recovered and the fishermen are able to catch more rockfish with more consistency, there’s this chicken-and-egg thing with getting the market back.”

The EDF has been working on the West Coast groundfish fishery for over 10 years and is deeply involved in shaping policy. Mahoney is also on the board of Positively Groundfish, a non-profit formed by a group of industry stakeholders – including Oregon State University, Marine Stewardship Council, fishermen, fish processors, etc. – to help coordinate and unify the efforts around getting the West Coast groundfish market going again.

Read the full story at Seafood Source