March 10, 2020 — Despite years of ever-increasing monitoring, cooperation from the fleet, and catch-shares-induced consolidation, the New England groundfish industry is still on shaky ground.
A Maine Fishermen’s Forum presentation by Melissa Errand of the New England Fishery Management Council illustrated the council-considered options for monitoring the groundfish fleet (Amendment 23). This presentation focused on the effects on the Maine-based fleet, which is Portland-based.
With projected costs of each alternative ranging from about $1 million to more than $5 million across the fleet, the council expects the changes to force groundfish boats with the fewest at-sea days to lease out their quota rather than go fishing.
The council’s preferred alternative is a blended model that allows boat owners to choose between traditional at-sea monitoring and electronic monitoring.
One Portland-based boat is using the experimental full-retention model that incorporates a combination of full-time cameras on the boat, landing all fish that would qualify as discards, and dockside monitoring and sampling of those retained discards.