December 30, 2019 — The following was released by the North Pacific Fishery Management Council:
The NPFMC will meet January 27 – February 2, 2020, at the Renaissance Hotel in Seattle. The AGENDA and SCHEDULE are now available. If you’re planning a flight, you can use the EasyBiz Discount Code: ECMC935. You can submit and review comments through each Agenda Item and the deadline for comments is Friday, January 24, 2020, at 12:00 pm (Alaska time).
December 11, 2019 — The Gulf of Alaska’s federal cod fleet is bracing for a complete shutdown in 2020 after an 80 percent TAC cut in 2018 and another 5 percent last year, down to 17,000 tons.
The North Pacific Fishery Management Council announced its decision on Friday, Dec. 6, in response to low recruitment.
“We’re on the knife’s edge of this overfished status,” said Council Member Nicole Kimball, vice president of Alaskan operations for the Pacific Seafood Processors Association.
The fall 2019 stock assessment returned biomass numbers for gulf cod below the necessary threshold as a food source for the endangered Steller sea lion.
The infamous Blob of 2014 — a mass of warm water that hovered in the Gulf of Alaska — likely depleted the cod’s food supply and severely restricted recruitment. The fall 2017 Gulf of Alaska survey yielded historically low numbers at 46,080 metric tons, down more than 80 percent since 2013.
“That warm water was sitting in the gulf for three years starting in 2014, and it was different than other years in that it went really deep and it also lasted throughout the winter,” said Steven Barbeaux with the Alaska Fisheries Science Center in Seattle. “You can deplete the food source pretty rapidly when the entire ecosystem is ramped up in those warm temperatures.”
December 9, 2019 — In an unprecedented response to historically low numbers of Pacific cod, the federal cod fishery in the Gulf of Alaska is closing for the 2020 season.
The decision, announced Friday, came as little surprise, but it’s the first time the fishery has closed due to concerns over low stock.
“We’re on the knife’s edge of this over-fished status,” North Pacific Fishery Management Council member Nicole Kimball said during talks in Anchorage.
It’s not over-fishing to blame for the die-off, but rather, climate change.
Warming ocean temperatures linked to climate change have wreaked havoc on a number of Alaska’s fisheries in recent years, decimating stocks and jeopardizing the livelihoods of fishermen and locals alike who rely on the industry.
A stock assessment this fall put Gulf cod populations at a historic low, with “next to no” new eggs, according to Steven Barbeaux, a research biologist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, who authored the report. At their current numbers, cod are below the federal threshold that protects them as a food source for endangered steller sea lions. Once below that line, the total allowable catch goes to zero. In other words, the fishery shuts down.
December 6, 2019 — The US North Pacific Fishery Management Council (NPFMC) is recommending that the preliminary total acceptable catch (TAC) for pollock in federal waters off the state of Alaska be set at 1.425 million metric tons in the Eastern Bering Sea.
That compares to a 2019 TAC of 1.397m metric tons and represents a 2% year-on-year increase.
The 2020 TAC recommendation falls within the 2m-metric-ton cap for all groundfish species within the eastern Bering Sea.
Additionally, the council recommended cutting the Pacific cod TAC in the Bering Sea by 4% to 141,799t. For Pacific cod in the Aleutian Islands, the recommended TAC is 13,796t, up from 12,214t in 2019.
Alaska’s Pacific cod biomass is down considerably in 2020 and will drop further in 2021, according to the draft stock assessment and fisheries evaluation (SAFE) report on stocks in the eastern Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands that was released last month.
Jim Ianelli, a veteran pollock scientist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration previously told Undercurrent News that a higher – or even level — TAC in 2020 would likely prove harder to fish.
December 5, 2019 — The following was released by the North Pacific Fishery Management Council:
After the December 2019 Council meeting, the NPFMC office will be moving three blocks west and one block north to 1007 W. 3rd Ave, Suite 400, Anchorage AK, 99501, still in downtown Anchorage. While the office will be closed to the public from December 16-27 to allow workers to accomplish tasks safely, you may still reach us via email. Our website, phone numbers, and email addresses will all remain the same.
The Council offices are all on the 4th floor of the building. We are excited that consolidating staff offices to be on the same floor will encourage collaboration and efficiency. We also expect to hold committee meetings on site in our newly-equipped conference room, with upgraded video and teleconferencing capabilities.
Currently, the first floor of this building houses the North Pacific Research Board, the Alaska Ocean Observing System and Alaska Sea Grant offices. We’re looking forward to being closer to our marine partners, and hope to be able to host an open house during the April Council meeting!
Thank you for your patience during this exciting endeavor.
December 3, 2019 — The total allowable catch (TAC) for US Pacific cod will drop again in 2020 and beyond, as Russia increases its TAC way past the Alaskans and also has now Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) for a large chunk of its fishery.
Alaska’s Pacific cod biomass is down considerably in 2020 and will drop further in 2021, according to the draft stock assessment and fisheries evaluation (SAFE) report on stocks in the eastern Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands, which will be discussed Monday at the North Pacific Fishery Management Council (NPFMC) meeting, held from Dec. 2-10, 2019, at the Hilton Hotel in Anchorage, Alaska.
At the end of the meeting, TACs for Pacific cod, pollock and other species will be recommended to the government. According to historical catch data, the last time Russia had a higher Pacific cod catch than the US and Canada was 1987, when it was 175,271t compared to 150,591t.
December 3, 2019 — Count Alaska’s northern rock sole among the fish species that appear to have more promise as water temperatures continue to increase as a result of climate change, Alaska TV station KTUU reports.
Using biomass data collected from 1982 through 2014 as well as wind and temperature data, Dan Cooper, a fish biologist with the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and his team have determined that the flatfish species has higher reproductive success in warmer years, according to the NBC affiliate.
Though its females grow to a size of up to 27 inches in length and males up to 19 inches, northern rock sole is harvested significantly less than pollock and Pacific cod, in Alaska. The North Pacific Fishery Management Council set the acceptable biological catch for the fish in the Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands at 143,000 metric tons for 2020, yet in 2018 only 60% of the total allowable catch was harvested, the news service noted.
November 27, 2019 — While the repercussions of climate change are complex and many impacts are unknown, newly published research suggests that one winner in a shifting environment is Alaska’s Northern rock sole.
The Northern rock sole is a flatfish that is commercially harvested, although it is fished significantly less than Pollock and Pacific cod.
Females grow up to 27 inches, while makes grow up to around 19 inches. The North Pacific Fishery Management Council set the acceptable biological catch for the fish in the Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands at 143,000 metric tons for 2020, yet in 2018 only 60% of the total allowable catch was harvested.
Research by NOAA Fisheries biologists suggest that the fish have higher reproductive success in warmer years, meaning that a higher percentage of eggs laid will grow to become part of the catch-able population.
The investigation started after surveys of juvenile showed dramatically different results in the same location.
“One year we went in this area between Nunivak Island and Cape Newenham offshore and we found very high densities of the animals. We estimated that there were billions and that was in 2003 – a warm year,” said Dan Cooper, a research fisheries biologist with NOAA’s Alaska Fisheries Science Center.
He said it’s the opposite in cold years.
November 19, 2019 — SEAFOOD NEWS — Last week the city of Adak asked a federal court to stay their order from last March — until January 1, 2021 — so the city’s only processing plant can operate during the Pacific cod season next year.
The March 2019 court decision agreed with plaintiffs representing the Bering Sea bottom trawl fleets that target flatfish, mackerel and cod, that Amendment 113, setting a 5,000 mt cod set-aside for remote villages in the Aleutian Islands, was not compliant with the Magnuson-Stevens Act.
The court vacated Amendment 113 and instructed the North Pacific Fisheries Management Council to work on an amendment that would comply with the legislation in specific areas.
The Council took up the issue, beginning an arduous process of analysis, developing alternatives, and public comment that will take at least another 18 months.
Meanwhile, representatives of the Adak plant, central to the economy of the 350-resident community, began an ambitious effort to find a pathway that would allow the set-aside to continue while the Council worked on corrections to a new amendment. But their efforts fell short, whether it was a plea for emergency action or language in new federal legislation for a temporary fix, last summer.
Even though the Council asked industry sectors to work together for a solution that could keep the Adak plant viable, there was no longer any authority providing a separate allocation for Adak, and little incentive to find an industry-based workaround.
In addition, all fleets targeting Pacific cod in the Bering Sea and the Aleutian Islands were well aware of the recent situation for cod stocks. Recent scientific assessments indicate the biomass is increasing in the northern Bering Sea and decreasing in traditional areas. Was the biomass moving north? How fast? Could the fish be crossing over to Russian waters? The ‘race for fish’ nature of the BSAI fishery made even the previously acceptable 5,000 mt set-aside — now vacated and available to anyone — more valuable than it was a few years ago.
Last Wednesday’s Memorandum in Support of Defendant-Intervenors’ Motion for Limited Relief From Judgment and Indicative Ruling included declarations of support from Adak as well as the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, Golden Harvest plant owner Jason Ogilvie, the Adak School District, and other private enterprises that rely on the winter operations of the plant.
City Manager Lyle Lockett noted that without continuous operation of its sole fish processing plant, Adak will see cascading economic impacts causing irrepairable harm to the community, including the city stopping subsidies to the school district, the medical clinic, the library, the gymnasium, and the community center.
“Shutting down the City Hall building would force all of these services to scramble to find a new location on the island, perhaps in private residences, which would be disruptive and likely expensive for Adak’s residents,” according to the memorandum.
Adak’s only school serves 19 students, 13 whose parents are employed directly or indirectly through the Adak plant. If enrollment drops to 10 or less, the state of Alaska’s subsidies stops and the school shuts down.
Both the crab and cod fleets that deliver to Adak would have no option other than Dutch Harbor to deliver their catch to — a 450-mile one-way trip.
The request asks the court to respond by January 10, 2020, ten days before the A season begins next year. The motion supporting the stay was filed while the original decision is under appeal, and would be subject to that ruling if it came before.
This story was originally published on SeafoodNews.com, a subscription site. It is reprinted with permission.
November 11, 2019 — In Kodiak’s Dog Bay harbor Jake Everich is puttering around the galley of his trawler, the Alaskan. He bought his boat in March to fish for rockfish and pollock around the Gulf of Alaska. It’s just under 75 feet — a relatively small operation.
Everich is among the fishermen affected by a recent decision from the North Pacific Fishery Management Council to increase observer fees from 1.25 to 1.65 percent of their catch value. When he sits down at the little galley table with his cup of coffee, he doesn’t seem worried the fee hike will put him under.
“I would say for my own business, no, it’s not that tight that,” he said. “You know, 0.4 percent isn’t gonna put me into bankruptcy.”
He’s clear that he doesn’t speak for all vessel owners when he says that. In an average season Everich’s gross is about half a million dollars, so the bump to observer fees means an extra $20,000 out of his profit margin.