Saving Seafood

How Finance Can Help Protect the World’s Ocean Resources

December 4, 2019 — Can finance contribute to seafood sustainability? This is an increasingly relevant question given the projected growth of seafood demand and the magnitude of social and environmental issues associated with its production.

Since the 1960s, aquaculture has been the world’s fastest-growing food sector. Rates of fish consumption have been increasing twice as rapidly as population growth, and fish has become one of the most traded food commodities.

Today, more than 90 percent of the world’s fisheries are either overexploited or fully exploited, and the sector is plagued with unsustainable practices, ranging from illegal fishing and habitat destruction to overuse of antibiotics and forced labour.

Making sure that seafood is both socially and environmentally sustainable has therefore become a key concern for governments, academics and civil society organisations.

In a recent article published in the journal Science Advances, my colleagues and I explored what role finance could play in promoting a sustainable seafood industry and where leverage points may lie to redirect capital towards better practices.

Read the full story at The Maritime Executive

NOAA, Coast Guard: More regs needed in wake of Rafael ’s fraud

December 4, 2019 — Representatives from NOAA and the US Coast Guard are using Carlos Rafael’s case as evidence that more regulations and oversight are necessary in the groundfishing industry.

NOAA Special Agent Troy Audyatis explained to a crowd gathered at the New England Fishery Management Council Meeting on Tuesday how NOAA worked with other agencies to catch the so-called Codfather and said, “We need to prevent something like this from ever repeating itself down the road.”

Rafael was sentenced to 46-months in federal prison for falsifying fishing quota, cash smuggling, and tax evasion in a criminal case, and was ordered to pay a $3 million penalty to address the federal government’s civil claims against him which included counts of misreporting and underreporting his groundfish catch.

Audyatis said if there wasn’t an observer, who collects data from U.S. commercial fishing and processing vessels for NOAA, on Rafael’s vessels or a dock-side officer “thousands upon thousands of fish would simply disappear” without being reported.

One of the reasons Audyatis gave for Rafael being able to misreport and underreport was the vertical integration of Rafael’s business.

Read the full story at the New Bedford Standard-Times

‘We caught him using his own words’ NOAA: Rafael’s own fishery complaints opened door to his downfall

December 4, 2019 — It turns out that it was Carlos Rafael himself who opened the door to the civil and criminal investigations that resulted in his exile from the commercial fishing industry and his current residency at the FMC Devens federal prison.

In January 2015, angered by cuts to his portion of federal groundfish disaster relief, Rafael publicly railed against the process and said he planned to sell his more than 40 vessels and the approximately 60 federal fishing permits attached to them.

And with that, according to a NOAA Office of Law Enforcement presentation Tuesday to the New England Fishery Management Council on the criminal case against Rafael, five federal law enforcement agencies saw their opening.

They began widespread undercover investigations that ultimately led to Rafael’s indictment and conviction in November 2017 for fisheries reporting violations, tax evasion and bulk smuggling.

“We took this as an opportunity to reach out to Carlos Rafael as interested buyers,” said OLE Special Agent Troy Audyatis. “We caught him using his own words.”

Read the full story at the Gloucester Daily Times

Coast Guard Report Finds Misreporting in Northeast Multispecies (Groundfish) Fisheries

December 2, 2019 (Saving Seafood) — WASHINGTON — Tomorrow, at the New England Fishery Management Council (NEFMC) December Meeting in Newport, Rhode Island, the United States Coast Guard will present a summary of an analysis it conducted from late 2014 through 2016 into potential misreporting in the Northeast Multispecies (NMS) fishery. The analysis identified over 350 trips from 2011-2015 where there is evidence of misreporting.

The Coast Guard analysis claims that several misreporting schemes were utilized from 2011 to 2015, and potentially up to 2.5 million pounds of regulated species were misreported by vessels from multiple sectors in the NMS fishery. The analysis also argues that the current regulation regime is vulnerable to stock area misreporting and limits the ability of enforcement to detect and document misreporting of stock areas.

Since February 2017, fishery managers have been developing Amendment 23 to the Northeast Multispecies (Groundfish) FMP, which would implement measures to improve reliability and accountability of catch reporting and ensure an accurate representation of catch (landings and discards). Amendment 23, which is currently in draft form, has been developed concurrently with the Coast Guard study, and is not a response to it. It has been developed by the NEFMC in consultation with the Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council, and the National Marine Fisheries Service. The draft amendment is available here: https://s3.amazonaws.com/nefmc.org/190905_Draft_Groundfish_A23_alternatives.pdf.

The Coast Guard report was authored by the First District Enforcement Staff and is available here: https://s3.amazonaws.com/nefmc.org/USCG-Groundfish-Misreporting-Investigation-and-Analysis.pdf.

The species of fish off the New England coast commonly referred to as “groundfish” are managed under the NMS Fishery Management Plan (FMP) and regulated under Title 50, Chapter VI, Part 648 of the Code of Federal Regulations (50 CFR 648). The latest updates on the development of NEFMC Amendment 23 to the Northeast Multispecies FMP are available here: https://www.nefmc.org/library/amendment-23.

NEFMC – Important Meeting Update – Time Changes for Tuesday, December 3 Agenda iIems

December 2, 2019 — The following was released by the New England Fishery Management Council:

This is an important update from the New England Fishery Management Council about its December 3-5, 2019 meeting in Newport, RI.

WHAT’S GOING ON:  Due to the winter storm that is impacting the region, the Council will begin its meeting at 10 a.m. on Tuesday, December 3 instead of 9 a.m. as originally scheduled in order to allow for additional travel time.
 
HAS THE AGENDA CHANGED:  The Council is not eliminating any agenda items.  However, timeslots have been adjusted to account for the delayed start, and the order of a few items has shifted.
  • Most notably, the open period for public comment and the update titled “Carlos Rafael Case/Misreporting Issues” both will take place following the lunch break under the revised agenda.
  • The item titled “Draft National Standard 1 Technical Guidance” now will be discussed prior to the lunch break.
WHERE CAN I FIND OUT MORE:  Visit the meeting webpage at NEFMC December 3-5, 2019 Newport, RI.
QUESTIONS:  Contact Janice Plante at (607) 592-4817, jplante@nefmc.org.

A crisis in the water is decimating this once-booming fishing town

November 29, 2019 — His ancestors were Portuguese colonialists who settled on this otherworldly stretch of coast, wedged between a vast desert and the southern Atlantic. They came looking for the one thing this barren region had in abundance: fish.

By the time Mario Carceija Santos was getting into the fishing business half a century later, in the 1990s, Angola had won independence and the town of Tombwa was thriving. There were 20 fish factories strung along the bay, a constellation of churches and schools, a cinema hall built in art deco, and, in the central plaza, massive drying racks for the tons upon tons of fish hauled out of the sea.

Since then, Tombwa’s fortunes have plummeted; Santos’s factory is one of just two remaining. The cinema hall is shuttered. Kids run around town barefoot instead of going to school. The central plaza is overgrown by weeds, its statue of a proud fisherman covered in bird droppings.

Sea temperatures off the Angolan coast have warmed 1.5 degrees Celsius — and possibly more — in the past century, according to a Washington Post analysis of National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration data.

In recent years, multiple studies have identified the waters along Tombwa’s coast in particular as a fast-warming hot spot: In one independent analysis of satellite-based NOAA data, temperatures have risen nearly 2 degrees Celsius since 1982. That is more than three times the global average rate of ocean warming.

Read the full story at The Washington Post

Coast Guard: Catch misreported on 350 fishing trips

December 2, 2019 — The Northeast multispecies groundfishery may have been victimized by several misreporting schemes through a five-year period and “potentially up to 2.5 million pounds of regulated species were misreported by vessels from multiple sectors” in the fishery, according to a Coast Guard investigation of misreporting.

The report chronicling the Coast Guard investigation from 2011 to 2015 will be presented to the New England Fishery Management Council on Tuesday during the first of its three days of meetings in Newport, Rhode Island.

The Coast Guard presentation is one of two scheduled agenda items dealing with catch misreporting that will be before the council on Tuesday.

The same day, NOAA Fisheries’ Office of Law Enforcement is scheduled to make a presentation to the council specifically on misreporting uncovered during the criminal case brought against now-incarcerated New Bedford fishing mogul Carlos Rafael.

In its 21-page report, the Coast Guard said the analysis by its Boston-based First District enforcement staff identified more than 350 vessel trips during the period of 2011 to 2015 in the Northeast multispecies groundfishery “where there appears to be evidence of misreporting.”

Read the full story at the Gloucester Daily Times

Carlos Rafael Inks $25 Million Deal with Blue Harvest Fisheries

November 29, 2019 — The highly-anticipated forced sell-off of “Codfather” Carlos Rafael’s fishing fleet appears to be near completion, only months after the convicted criminal unloaded his scallop boats.

Undercurrent News reports that Blue Harvest Fisheries has inked a $25 million deal to buy at least 35 vessels and skiffs from Rafael along with their permits and fishing quotas. Blue Harvest maintains fleets in Fairhaven and in Newport News, Virginia. It is backed by Bregal Partners, a New York City-based private equity firm.

The pending deal with Blue Harvest – which still must survive a “right of first refusal” where other harvesters could step forward – comes as Rafael remains behind bars.

Rafael was arrested in 2016 following a federal sting, and was convicted on 28 criminal counts in 2017. Rafael admitted to raking in illegal profits and gaming the system by mislabeling 700,000 pounds of harvested fish over four years. He also illegally avoided paying taxes. Rafael was sentenced to 46 months in federal prison. To settle a separate civil suit with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, he was forced to sell his fishing fleet, pay $3 million in penalties, and never engage in the world of commercial fishing again.

Read the full story at WBSM

US fisheries sees first IP-based broadband terminal and vessel monitoring

November 26, 2019 — An estimated 4,000 legally licensed commercial fishing vessels are permitted to fish in US Fisheries Management regions. These are required to report their GPS positions via a type-approved secure satellite link.

As explained, iFleetONE VMS is the first mobile satellite terminal to provide secure VMS services for NMFS with full-featured voice and IP-based communications capabilities.

In addition, it is expected, for the first time, to enable every stakeholder in the VMS ecosystem, including NMFS Law Enforcement, fisheries management officials and other end users to have a platform to develop new and previously limited applications.

As such, this terminal and VMS combination is expected to transform regulatory compliance, fisheries governance in US waters to sustain fish numbers and protect ocean habitats, explained Inmarsat’s Eric Griffin, VP for Offshore & Fishing.

Read the full story at Safety4Sea

Deadly life at sea: UN partners spotlight depths of danger in fishing industry

November 22, 2019 — The following was released by the United Nations:

“Every hour fishers die doing their job – not just men, women too”, Maria Helena Samedo, chief for Climate and Natural Resources at the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), explained at a major conference organized by the agency in Rome, coinciding with World Fisheries Day on 21 November.

“Human rights violations and unacceptable practices at different stages of the value chain are increasing in fisheries and aquaculture”, she added.

Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated (IUU) fishing leads to over-exploitation of fish stocks, already drained by pollution and climate impacts, and financially burdens honest fishers and the communities that depend on them, FAO and the International Labour Organisation (ILO)  said  in a joint statement at the conclusion of the International Symposium on Fisheries Sustainability.

Beyond injuring biodiversity and economies, IUU casts a dark shadow on already physically-taxing sea labour, with many IUU fishers engaging in transnational crimes, such as human and drug trafficking and piracy.

Read the full release here