Saving Seafood

Lobster legislation a ‘Christmas miracle’ for Maine’s industry – if it passes

December 22, 2022 — Maine’s congressional delegation has perhaps never been so united as it was in adding a provision to the massive government spending bill that they believe could save the lobster industry from economic ruin.

Lawmakers in Washington are working feverishly this week to pass the omnibus appropriations bill that would fund federal agencies through the next fiscal year. The current stopgap spending measure expires Friday. Maine’s delegation succeeded in adding a rider to the bill that would protect Maine lobstermen for six years from federal regulations they claim could decimate the state’s iconic industry and coastal economy. Environmental groups, however, contend the provision announced Tuesday could wipe out the endangered North Atlantic right whales.

The rider would essentially reverse a federal court decision this summer on new lobstering regulations by preventing them from taking effect until Dec. 31, 2028.

This would not only bring the fishery back into compliance with environmental laws but would also give fishery officials and researchers time to study potential new types of lobster gear less likely to entangle the whales, and to learn more about them and how much they frequent Maine waters.

Read the full article at the Press Herald

Maine lawmakers use spending bill to delay lobster restrictions

December 21, 2022 — Maine’s congressional delegation slipped an amendment into the $1.7 trillion federal spending bill that would delay for six years new protections for endangered whales to protect Maine’s lobster industry.

The amendment would leave existing lobster fishing regulations in place for the time being, thwarting new restrictions aimed at protecting North Atlantic right whales, which are vulnerable to entanglement in fishing gear. A federal judge previously delayed the new rules until 2024 to give the government time to craft them.

Read the full article at wbur

UMaine leads $3 million study on how warming Arctic affects American lobster in New England, Atlantic Canada

December 20, 2022 — Investigating how a rapidly warming Arctic will affect American lobster populations and the communities that depend on them in New England and Atlantic Canada will be the focus of a University of Maine-led study backed by a $3 million award from the National Science Foundation’s Navigating the New Arctic Program (NNA).

Richard Wahle, director of the university’s Lobster Institute and professor in the School of Marine Sciences, is spearheading the project, dubbed the NNA Lobster Network, joined by 18 other researchers from UMaine, the Gulf of Maine Research Institute, Columbia University, Florida State University and Memorial University of Newfoundland. Building on long-standing partnerships with the fishing industry, government and academic organizations, the team will investigate how climate-induced Arctic change alters lobster abundance and distribution from coastal Rhode Island to Newfoundland.

NSF funded the study not only as part of its NNA initiative, but also as one of its 10 Big Ideas. The NNA Lobster Network will support investigations into the influence of past and future climate and management scenarios on various physical, biological and socio-economic conditions at different scales; all through cross-sector and cross-border partnerships.

Read the full article at Bangor Daily News

Save whales or eat lobster? The battle reaches the White House

December 12, 2022 — President Macron of France may not have realised it, but he walked into another fishing war earlier this month when he and 200 other guests were treated at the White House to butter-poached Maine lobster accented with American Osetra caviar and garnished with celery crisp.

At issue was the lobster, currently subject to a court ruling designed to prevent Maine’s lobstermen from trapping the crustacea in baited pots marked by lines that can fatally entangle feeding North Atlantic right whales. There are now just 340 such whales, with only about 100 breeding females, making the species one of the most endangered on the planet.

The Maine Lobster Marketing Collaborative celebrated the choice, saying it was “proud” that the guests were “enjoying the delicious taste of Maine lobster”. The international advocacy group Oceana countered that “lobster on their menu cannot be considered sustainable by any definition”.

The dispute between Maine’s $1bn lobster industry, which employs more than 10,000 lobstermen, the White House and new protections issued by National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, has deep roots.

The right whale population has dropped from 500 a decade ago while Maine’s lobster industry has boomed. The industry disputes that its vertical lines attached to buoys are to blame. Some point to ship collisions, others to gillnets.

Read the full article at The Guardian 

MAINE: Maine Republicans want to end tax breaks over lobster bans

December 10, 2022 — Maine Republicans are pushing back against a boycott effort targeting lobster sales, with a plan to eliminate tax breaks for Whole Foods and other food companies that pull the popular crustacean from their stores.

Legislation expected to be filed by the GOP minority for consideration in the next session would prevent Whole Foods, or other groups that ban lobster sales from getting tax breaks available to Maine businesses.

The proposal would also prohibit the state from entering into contracts with the nationwide grocery store chain.

Last week, Whole Foods announced plans to stop selling lobster caught in the Gulf of Maine at hundreds of its retail stores across the country. The company cited concerns raised by a pair of sustainability groups over the impact of the lobster industry on critically endangered north Atlantic right whales.

Read the full article at the Center Square

Ban on salmon farming in Wash. ignites new worries in Maine

December 10, 2022 — Aquaculture opponents in Maine celebrated earlier this year when they helped convince state officials to block a proposed industrial fish farm in the waters of Frenchman Bay, right next to Acadia National Park.

This week, they said they’re now gearing up for another threat, fearing that Washington state’s decision last month to ban net-pen salmon fish farming could once again increase the pressure to develop Maine’s coastal waters.

Henry Sharpe, president of the opposition group Frenchman Bay United, said he was pleased that Washington state had decided to join Alaska, California and Oregon in banning net-pen farms.

But he said he was also “deeply concerned that … others will now see Maine as an even more inviting place to build large ocean-based fish farms.”

“We hope Maine officials are paying close attention to what is happening in these places that went big for ocean-based salmon farming only to now ban it,” Sharpe said.

Washington state’s decision to get rid of its fish farms has drawn attention from both conservation groups that oppose aquaculture on environmental grounds and businesses that hail it as a safe way to increase U.S. seafood production.

Washington state had long been regarded as a leader in salmon farming, allowing it in the waters of Puget Sound for more than 30 years.

But the industry took a huge hit in 2017 when a net pen operated by Canada-based Cooke Aquaculture Inc. near the San Juan archipelago collapsed and released 260,000 nonnative Atlantic salmon.

Read the full article at E&E News

Maine lobstermen warn Biden admin is trying to put them out of business with harsh eco rules

December 7, 2022 — Industry groups and both Democratic and Republican lawmakers from Maine are sounding the alarm that a pending federal environmental regulation would crush the state’s vaunted lobster industry.

The proponents of Maine’s nearly $1 billion lobster industry have argued that federal rules aimed at protecting the endangered right whale species from fishing equipment in federally-managed waters are unfairly attacking blue-collar lobstermen who rely on the resource to make a living. They have warned that the regulation threatens the livelihood of thousands of Maine lobstermen and individuals employed in supporting industries.

“I don’t know what we would even retrain lobstermen to do. A lot of guys are already talking about potentially selling their boats and moving elsewhere,” Patrice McCarron, the executive director of the Maine Lobstermen’s Association (MLA), told FOX Business in an interview. “The economy is so rural here that it’s, you couldn’t overstate how much losing the lobster dollars coming into the communities will debilitate everything.”

“It is just such a special and unique situation that we have here in Maine,” McCarron continued. “That’s why we’re all fighting so hard. We’re going to do everything in our power to keep this industry going and to keep these families here and to have lobstermen be able to proudly raise their children and see another generation of lobstermen come through because we need that.”

Read the full article at Fox Business

 

Could trawler cams help save world’s dwindling fish stocks?

December 7, 2022 — For years, Mark Hager’s job as an observer aboard New England fishing boats made him a marked man, seen as a meddling cop on the ocean, counting and scrutinizing every cod, haddock and flounder to enforce rules and help set crucial quotas.

On one particularly perilous voyage, he spent 12 days at sea and no crew member uttered even a single word to him.

Now Hager is working to replace such federally-mandated observers with high-definition cameras affixed to fishing boat masts. From the safety of his office, Hager uses a laptop to watch hours of footage of crew members hauling the day’s catch aboard and measuring it with long sticks marked with thick black lines. And he’s able to zoom in on every fish to verify its size and species, noting whether it is kept or flung overboard in accordance with the law.

“Once you’ve seen hundreds of thousands of pounds of these species it becomes second nature,” said Hager as he toggled from one fish to another.

Read the full article at the Associated Press

Lobster Fishermen Are Fighting Back Against Whole Foods’ Lobster Ban

December 3, 2022 — With a strong focus on sustainability and how our food is sourced, especially seafood, there was bound to be a moment of conflict between those whose job it is to catch the food and those who protect the environment.

The Maine lobster industry has been downgraded by two seafood-monitoring groups that certify the sustainability of certain seafood products. Seafood Watch, which is operated by the Monterey Bay Aquarium in California, labeled Maine lobster “red” in September. Citing the potential entanglement risk lobstermen’s gear caused to the endangered North Atlantic right whale, the group recommended that consumers avoid Maine lobster (via Monterey Bay Aquarium). In November, the Marine Stewardship Council said they would suspend the sustainability certificate for the Gulf of Maine lobster industry. The group acknowledged that there’s no substantial evidence that the industry has harmed right whales but revoked the certification because “the fishery is no longer in compliance with all relevant laws [and] does not meet the MSC Fisheries Standard.” The fishing gear in question is fixed-gear, meaning vertical ropes are continuously in the water (via Marine Stewardship Council). The ban has affected Whole Foods and now fishermen are speaking up.

Read the full article at Mashed

Maine lobster still on the menu at White House

December 3, 2022 — U.S. diplomacy is trumping environmental activism today when it comes to Maine lobster, with 200 of the Pine State’s signature seafood on the Thursday dinner menu for French president Emmanuel Macron’s visit with President Biden.

News reports on the menu for dinner at the White House described butter-poached Maine lobster as the opener before beef with shallot marmalade and triple-cooked butter potatoes.

Read the full article at National Fisherman