Saving Seafood

U.S. bans more Mexico seafood imports to protect vaquita porpoises

March 11, 2020 — Almost all Mexican shrimp and fish caught from the northern Gulf of California was barred from U.S. trade March 4, as NMFS invoked the Marine Mammal Protection Act in a bid to stop use of gillnets blamed for entangling endangered vaquita porpoises.

The porpoises’ population had already plunged from an estimated 560 animals in the 1990s to 30 surviving by 2017, when the Mexican government officials banned most gillnets in the area.

But the rule was poorly enforced, and the NMFS import ban puts more pressure on the government to carry out blanket prohibition and enforcement that environmental groups and marine scientists say are the only chance for saving the porpoises.

“Mexico has no choice but to eliminate the destructive fishing taking place in the northern Gulf of California that is driving the vaquita to extinction,” said Zak Smith, a senior attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council. “It’s the only hope the vaquita has for survival, and it is required if Mexico wants to resume exporting these products to the United States.”

Read the full story at National Fisherman

California’s ban on shark fins doesn’t stop the trade from passing through its ports

February 25, 2020 — Three years ago, a cargo container purportedly transporting thousands of pounds of pickles from Panama was placed on a Hong Kong-bound ship that stopped at the Port of Oakland on a chilly February night. Hundreds of rectangular containers were stacked on the giant vessel like Lego blocks, but state and federal wildlife agents knew there was something fishy about this one.

Inside, the agents found nearly 52,000 pounds of frozen shark fins, cut from an estimated 9,500 sharks. A cursory inspection revealed that some of the fins were from protected species that require permits to be legally traded. So officials seized the shipment, valued at just under $1 million, making it one of the largest single shark fin seizures in U.S. history.

California may have banned the shark fin trade years ago, but the container is hardly the only one of its kind passing through the state’s bustling ports: A recent report from the Natural Resources Defense Council estimated that hundreds of thousands of pounds of shark fins from Latin America transit West Coast and other U.S. ports each year, destined to land in a bowl of shark fin soup in Hong Kong and other Asian cities.

“We think we’ve just found the tip of the iceberg, and it’s a little hard to say how big the iceberg is,” said the report’s author, Elizabeth Murdock, the San Francisco-based director of the environmental group’s Pacific Oceans Initiative.

The wildlife agents and scientists waiting for the container in Oakland on Feb. 10, 2017, had been tipped off by U.S. Customs and Border Protection, whose agents had cracked open the container at the Port of Long Beach. An agency spokesperson declined to comment on what led to the container’s initial inspection, but its contents were a far cry from the “cucumbers/gherkins” listed as the shipment’s tariff code.

The fin trade is driven by the high demand for shark fin soup, a Chinese delicacy that has caused the value of fins to skyrocket to as much as $500 a pound.

Read the full story at The Mercury News

Court Upholds Creation of National Monument in Atlantic

December 27, 2019 — A federal appeals court on Friday upheld former President Barack Obama’s designation of a federally protected conservation area in the Atlantic Ocean, a move that commercial fishermen oppose.

Fishing groups sued over the creation of Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument, a 5,000-square-mile (8,000-square-kilometer) area that contains fragile deep sea corals and vulnerable species of marine life. The monument was established in 2016.

A federal judge dismissed the lawsuit last year, and the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit upheld the decision Friday.

The appeals panel brushed aside arguments that federal law governing monuments applies only to land, not oceans; that the area of the ocean is not “controlled” by the federal government; that it is not compatible with National Marine Sanctuaries Act; and that it is not the “smallest area compatible” with management goals.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at The New York Times

Bottom-trawling fishing severely restricted off West Coast starting in January

November 19, 2019 — The most extensive ban on bottom trawling — dragging weighted nets on the sea floor — became law Tuesday after fishing groups and environmentalists agreed to protect more than 140,000 square miles of seafloor habitat along the West Coast, including beds of lush coral around the Farallon Islands.

The new regulations, which will take effect Jan. 1 after being published in the Federal Register on Tuesday, will restrict fishing over 90% of the seafloor along the coast from Canada to Mexico, the largest contiguous area protected from bottom trawling in the world.

At the same time, about 3,000 square miles of sandy seafloor previously closed to fishing under the 2002 Rockfish Conservation Area rules were reopened after it was determined that rockfish populations had recovered in those areas.

“It’s monumental,” said Geoffrey Shester, the senior scientist for the conservation group Oceana, which has fought for years to limit bottom trawling, long considered the most damaging method of fishing in the ocean. “It puts the West Coast at the top of the barrel for global leadership in protecting our seafloor.”

Read the full story at the San Fransisco Chronicle 

Tribes, environmental groups sue to stop mine in Alaskan salmon spawning areas

October 9, 2019 — Five native, business and environmental organizations sued the Environmental Protection Agency on Tuesday over a proposed controversial Alaska gold and copper mine that the Trump administration has backed after it reversed an Obama-era decision that stopped the project due to environmental concerns.

On Tuesday the five groups, representing 31 tribes and tribal governments as well as a seafood development association and hundreds of commercial fishing interests, all sued the EPA in federal court in Anchorage, Alaska, over the administration’s lifting of the Obama EPA 2014 Clean Water Act protections. The Trump administration in late July lifted the Obama EPA’s roadblock on the massive proposed Pebble mine, allowing the project to largely move forward towards the permitting process.

On Wednesday a similar lawsuit was filed against the EPA by more than a dozen other environmental groups, including the Natural Resources Defense Council, Defenders of Wildlife, the National Parks Conservation Association and SalmonState. Like the lawsuit filed Tuesday, these environmental groups Wednesday allege the EPA broke the law when it recently withdrew the Obama-era protections that had stopped the mine.

Read the full story at CNN

MAINE: Environmentalists weigh in on right whale rules for lobster industry

August 16, 2019 — Environmentalists showed up in large numbers Thursday night to urge federal fishing regulators to defend the endangered right whale against what they claim is the looming extinction threat posed by the Maine lobster industry.

Some of the largest and most powerful animal and environmental groups – including Oceana, the Natural Resources Defense Council, the Pew Charitable Trusts, the U.S. Humane Society and the Conservation Law Foundation – sent representatives to the National Marine Fisheries Service meeting in South Portland.

They urged the fisheries service to take immediate action to protect the species, which now numbers about 400, calling for actions such as offshore fishing closures and ropeless lobster fishing that even a team tasked with protecting the whale had dismissed as too drastic as recently as April.

Read the full story at the Portland Press Herald

Seismic surveying proposal in Atlantic raises Bay concerns

March 25, 2019 — The Atlantic Ocean is staring down the barrel of an air gun, and its blast could reverberate into the Chesapeake Bay.

Despite outcry from coastal communities and most East Coast states, the Trump administration is moving forward with allowing five companies to perform seismic surveys offshore from Delaware Bay to central Florida.

Environmental groups and many marine scientists fear that the tests’ loud, repeated blasts, which are used to detect oil and gas deposits deep beneath the ocean floor, could upend an underwater ecosystem that relies on sound for communication.

“The ocean is an acoustic world,” said Michael Jasny, director of the Natural Resources Defense Council’s marine mammal protection program. “Whales, fish and many other species depend on sound to survive. The extensive blasting that the Trump administration has authorized would undermine marine life on an enormous scale.”

The NRDC joined several environmental groups in a federal lawsuit filed in South Carolina in December, challenging the administration’s approval of the seismic surveys a month earlier. On Feb. 20, the conservation groups asked the judge in the case to block the seismic tests from going forward while the litigation is pending. The National Marine Fisheries Service decision allows the companies to “incidentally harass” marine mammals during the tests.

Read the full story at the Bay Journal

Congressmen Van Drew and Rutherford Introduce ACEPA

February 11, 2019 — The following was released by the office of Congressman Jefferson Van Drew:

In response to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) issuing five Incidental Harassment Authorizations (IHAs) which would advance permit applications for seismic air gun blasting off the Atlantic Coast, Congressmen Jeff Van Drew and John Rutherford have introduced the bipartisan Atlantic Coastal Economies Protection Act to prohibit or stop seismic air gun testing in the Atlantic Ocean. Seismic air gun testing is the first step towards offshore oil and gas exploration and a direct threat to the coastal fishing and tourism economies dependent on healthy ocean ecosystems.

Congressman Jeff Van Drew has a history of working to protect the coastal economy and environment. In 2018 during his time in the New Jersey state legislature, he introduced and passed Senate Bill No. 258 which prohibited offshore oil or natural gas exploration, development, and production in state waters. “Our local economy is dependent on fishing, tourism and wildlife watching – the bottom line is offshore oil and gas drilling isn’t worth the risk,” said Van Drew.

“The waters off the East Coast are home to vulnerable mammal populations, military operations, tourist destinations, and a vibrant maritime economy. Allowing seismic testing in the Atlantic is unnecessary and potentially hazardous to the coastal communities that rely on a healthy ecosystem. The U.S. should not jeopardize our coastal economy by expanding seismic testing and offshore drilling, particularly when our energy needs continue to be met,” said Congressman John Rutherford.

Van Drew and Rutherford were joined in the effort by Representatives Chris Smith (R-NJ), Joe Cunningham (D-SC), Brian Mast (R-FL), and Donna Shalala (D-FL). The bill was also endorsed by a variety of stakeholders ranging from local chambers of commerce and fisheries organizations to conservation and environmental groups.

Endorsements: Oceana, League of Conservation Voters, Surfrider Foundation, Natural Resources Defense Council, Sierra Club, Environment America, Earthjustice, Conservatives for Responsible Stewardship, Hands Across the Sand, American Littoral Society, Ocean Conservation Research, Recreational Fishing Alliance, American Sportfishing Association, International Game Fish Association, Center for Sportfishing Policy

Read the release here

Wind project partners with environmentalists on rare whales

January 24, 2019 — The developer of an offshore wind energy project is partnering with environmental groups on a plan to try to protect the endangered North Atlantic right whale.

The whale is one of the rarest marine mammals. It’s thought to number only 411 individuals . The animals travel through New England waters every year.

Vineyard Wind, the Natural Resources Defense Council, the National Wildlife Federation and the Conservation Law Foundation announced an agreement designed to protect the whales on Wednesday.

Read the full story from the Associated Press at the Gloucester Daily Times

Appeals court blocks another US gov’t effort to overcome Mexico gillnet import ban

November 30, 2018 — The US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on Wednesday shot down an effort by the US National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) and other federal agencies to end a four-month-old ban on the import of Mexican shrimp and other seafood caught in the country with the use of gillnets.

The decision to reject a “stay of the order” request backs a US Court of International Trade (CIT) ruling, issued in July, that was sought by the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), Center for Biological Diversity and Animal Welfare Institute as part of an effort to protect the endangered vaquita porpoise in the northern Gulf of California from being driven into extinction by pressuring the Mexican government.

Widely decimated by the use of gillnets in pursuit of the totoaba — another endangered fish sought for its swim bladder due to black market demand in China — there are believed to be a little more than a dozen vaquita remaining.

Read the full story at Undercurrent News