New England Young Fishermen’s Alliance Archives

Program turns New England deckhands into captains

August 19, 2024 — For experienced commercial fishermen ready to elevate their careers, the New England Young Fishermen’s Alliance (NEYFA) offers an opportunity through its Deckhand to Captain (DTC) Training Program. This intensive nine-month course is designed to guide individuals from seasoned deckhands to successful owner-operators. I was able to sit in on a class and get a detailed look at what the program offers and some of the latest updates from the local fishing community.

NEYFA’s DTC Training Program is open to commercial fishermen with at least three years of experience as a deckhand or sternman. The program equips trainees with essential skills in business management, loan acquisition, financing, public speaking, industry regulations, collaborative marketing, and branding, among other skills. The students benefit from one-on-one mentorship with their experienced captain mentor, class guest speakers, members of the fishing community, and guidance from the program’s founder, Andrea Tomlinson. Tomlinson began working within the commercial fishing industry shortly after she graduated from the University of New Hampshire (UNH). On her first trip fishing in the Gulf of Maine, she was hooked on creating an impactful career within the industry. Her background spans years in aquaculture to groundfish and encouraging the coastal communities to support fishermen and buy local seafood.

“I knew I wanted to be a marine biologist and work with the sea since I was about ten years old, fishing for fluke and bluefish off the docks at Clarkes Landing marina in Point Pleasant, NJ, where our family kept our rec boat growing up. I have worked in wild-caught fisheries and, before that, in finfish and shellfish aquaculture for most of my career,” shared Tomlinson.

Read the full article at the National Fisherman

Young Fishermen Are Struggling to Stay Afloat

November 24, 2022 — Lucas Raymond has been working as a deckhand on a boat that catches monkfish, pollock, hake, and occasional cod out of New Hampshire’s Rye Harbor for the last decade. His fishing trips often involve navigating rough, stormy waters and typically last two to three days, but the 30-year-old enjoys doing physical work outside. “Even at the end of a very hard day, it’s rewarding,” Raymond says.

He considers fishermen to be some of society’s last hunters. “We bring in a very healthy, natural wild protein source, and that’s so important. It’s a shame to watch [the industry] struggle the way it is.”

Like many sectors, commercial fishing is facing a worker shortage, with too few young fishermen coming in to replace the aging workforce. The average age of groundfish and lobster captains in New England is 55 years old, according to the New England Young Fishermen’s Alliance (NEYFA). “It’s an industry that is truly dying,” Raymond said. “There are so few people getting into it. It’s incredibly disheartening.”

Read the full article at Civil Eats

Cultivating Tomorrow’s Fisherman Across New England

May 10, 2022 — The kids who hung around Perkins Cove, Maine, back in the 1960s wanted to be fishermen. By the time we were 10 or 12 years old, the ocean, boats, and fish had cast their spell on us. We knew who Mickey Mantle and Carl Yastrzemski were, but our heroes parked their pickups by the bait wharf and harpooned bluefin tuna from their boats.

We dreamed not so much of hitting home runs but of chugging into the harbor at night and unloading 600-pound giants in front of awestruck tourists peering down from the wharf.

Quite a few of us wound up fishing, at least for a while. And some of us still do.

But times have changed. And as fishing’s fortunes have declined, so, too has the number of aspiring fishermen.

“It has become painfully evident that our area is suffering from the ‘graying of the fleet,’” says Andrea Tomlinson, founder and executive director of the nascent, New Hampshire-based New England Young Fishermen’s Alliance. The Alliance’s mission is to provide aspiring fishermen with a pathway into the fleet. “This is a project I have been trying to develop for over four years.”

Read the full story at National Fisherman

The Development of the New England Young Fishermen’s Alliance – NH Based Young Fishermen’s Alliance Organization Forms with Help from the USDA

May 9, 2022 — The following was released by the New England Young Fishermen’s Alliance:

As a response to the national phenomenon called the “graying of the fleet” former GM of NH Community Seafood, Andrea Tomlinson sets out to organize, train and advocate for the next generation of northern New England fishermen and women

In response to an increasing decline of younger generation fishermen and women entering the commercial fishing industry in northern New England, former GM of NH Community Seafood, Andrea Tomlinson, has collaborated with Yankee Fishermen’s Cooperative, the UNH NH Food Hub Network, Gorhan Public Health Consulting and the Rockingham Economic Development Center to develop the New England Young Fishermen’s Alliance

(NEYFA). The development of the long-awaited Alliance is made possible by a USDA LAMP Farmer’s Market Promotion Program grant, awarded in late 2021, with funding secured in February of this year. In addition to forming the New England Young Fishermen’s Alliance into a nonprofit entity, the USDA grant also supports three annual Deckhand to Captain Training programs, which will be sponsored by the Alliance.

In a series focus groups called Dock Talks: Next Generation, held in 2019, with collaboration from NH Sea Grant, NH Community Seafood and NH Food Alliance, young fishermen expressed that the major barriers to entering the industry as a Captain were capital requirements necessary for a boat and a permit, complex and restrictive regulations within the industry, lack of reliable and knowledgeable labor and consumers misinterpretation of the commercial fishing industry. As an entry level Captain in the commercial fishing industry today, the initial capital requirement is $250,000 minimum, to purchase a boat, permit and equipment.

Experienced deckhands and sternmen, with a minimum of 5 years’ experience in the industry working on either groundfish, charter and/or lobster boats will be eligible to apply for a free 10 -month training program to get more of the next generation of young fishermen and women into the Captain’s wheelhouse. The cohort of 6 trainees for the 2022 training have been chosen and range in age from 27-38 years old. The Deckhand to Captain training program is a first of its kind in New England, where experienced young fishermen and women will receive instruction on business management and training, collaborative marketing, industry standard and regulations, permitting and compliance, public speaking and pairing with a veteran Captain as a mentor.

There has been a drastic reduction in succession within commercial fishing industry nationwide with the average age of both groundfish and lobster Captains in New Hampshire and much of northern New England, currently averaging 55 years old. Similarly, the amount of 600-trap lobster permits in NH, the most common permit in the state, has declined by almost 66 % from 2000 to 2021 (NH Fish and Game, 2022). More concerning is the dramatic decrease in groundfish vessels currently fishing in NH and northern New England. In NH alone, 104 groundfish vessels were licensed to harvest groundfish in 2000, but by 2021, a mere 18 vessels obtained groundfish licenses and of them, only five vessels are currently commercially fishing for groundfish from our NH shores. Within the last two years, NH has seen four veteran groundfish Captains retire with no younger generation Captains to take their place.

The Deckhand to Captain Training Program, intends to assist entry level Captains in transitioning from the back of the deck to the Captain’s wheelhouse. The development of the organization as a nonprofit will be assisted through a recent acceptance into the Portsmouth-based nonprofit incubator called GoodWork. With a team of skilled and experienced coaches, professional partners and mentors, the GoodWork nonprofit incubator program helps facilitate learning and guide incubator participants on the path towards success. The program builds on participant’s strengths to assist them to be more effective, collaborative, adaptive, and better prepared to achieve their mission.

Once developed, the NEYFA plans to offer resources and networking opportunities, relevant speakers as well as ongoing training programs designed to benefit the young fishing industry in southern Maine, NH and northern Massachusetts. The Alliance also intends to increase young industry participation at both state and regional regulatory meetings that encourage industry input when developing regulations and industry standards at public hearings.

“This is a project I have been trying to develop for over four years. Through my years of direct interaction with the commercial fishing community in northern New England, it has become painfully evident that our area is suffering from the “graying of the fleet”. There are far too many deterring obstacles in the path of an entry-level Captain in this industry and we need to change that scenario in order to preserve the heritage and culture of our working waterfronts in northern New England. The New England commercial fisherman is becoming an endangered species and we need to fix that, “says Founder/Executive Director, Andrea Tomlinson.

David Goethel, veteran fisheries advocate, and recently retired commercial fisherman also sits on the Yankee Fishermen’s Cooperative Board of Directors. “I am very pleased to see six qualified people selected for training in starting their own commercial fishing businesses. Commercial fishermen feed America and I am glad to see young people stepping forward to replace those of us aging out of the fishery,” said Goethel.

Yankee Fishermen’s Cooperative is the grant applicant and administrator. General Manager and Authorized Organizational Representative (AOR) on the grant, Linda Hunt feels “We at Yankee Fishermen’s Cooperative are so happy to see this program in our area. We are so excited to support this.”