red grouper Archives - Saving Seafood

Red grouper could be precedent for new Gulf catch reallocations

June 17, 2022 — Gulf of Mexico reef fish fishermen expect to face off in court against the National Marine Fisheries Service later this summer. They’re challenging the agency’s recent reallocation of some of their red grouper Individual Fishing Quota to the recreational sector.

Fishermen have more at stake than the cut in their grouper quota: NMFS and the Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Council are already forging ahead with serial reallocations of other fisheries. The lawsuit may be their best, if not only, chance to stop them.

“We’re 2 and 0 against the NMFS in the courts,” said Eric Brazer, deputy director of the Galveston, Texas-based Gulf of Mexico Reef Fish Shareholders Alliance. Other plaintiffs in the suit include A.P. Bell Fish Company, of Cortez, Florida, and the Southern Offshore Fishing Association, a longliner group based in Madeira Beach, Florida.

The courts sided with commercial fishermen in 2014 and 2017 when they challenged the council and NMFS over actions to extend the recreational red snapper season and reallocate more quota to the sector.

“The council took action that harmed the commercial fishermen and rewarded the recreational fishermen. We told them it was not legal, they didn’t believe us. They approved the document, we took them to court, and we won,” said Brazer.

Read the full story at National Fisherman

Gulf Coast commercial fishermen file lawsuit over new red grouper quotas

May 23, 2022 — The federal government will soon impose new limits on the amount of red grouper that commercial fishers can catch in the Gulf of Mexico and local business owners say that will impact the industry and their customers.

“It will definitely cost you more today. And will probably cost you more tomorrow because there’ll be less allocation,” said Frank Chivas, owner of Baystar Restaurant Group, which operates 12 restaurants in the greater Tampa Bay region.

Karen Bell, owner of A.P. Bell Fishing Company in Cortez agrees that the price for grouper is likely to rise.

“It’s limiting what we’re able to sell to the public,” she said. “When the supply is reduced, the price goes up because there’s less of it available.”

Earlier this month, the government announced an amendment to the National Marine Fisheries Service management plan. The quota for recreational fishing would rise from 24 percent to 40.7 percent, while the commercial share would decline from 76 percent to 59.3 percent.

Bell has signed on to a federal lawsuit challenging the reallocation of the red grouper harvest.

“I don’t dislike the recreational sector,” she said. “In fact, we pack bait for them and I think it’s important that they have quality time on the water just like we do but to shift it to give it to someone else when we provide it to the non-fishing public, that’s a hard pill to swallow.”

Read the full story at WUSF Public Media

Commercial Fishermen, Other Members of Seafood Industry Challenging NOAA’s Red Grouper Reallocation

May 11, 2022 — Last week SeafoodNews reported on NOAA’s Amendment 53, a new rule in the Federal Register regarding the reef fish fishery of the Gulf of Mexico. The final rule revised the annual catch limits (ACLs) and annual catch targets (ACTs) for both the commercial and recreational sectors, reallocating 20% of the commercial red grouper quota to the recreational sector. The decision had commercial fishermen and others in the industry up in arms. But they’re not just sitting back. A lawsuit has been filed challenging the legality of the decision to reallocate the red grouper quota to recreational fishermen.

The lawsuit was filed late on Friday in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia by A.P. Bell Fish Company, the Southern Offshore Fishing Association, and the Gulf of Mexico Reef Fish Shareholders’ Alliance.

“This case is about the government’s allocation of fishing privileges for catching red grouper in the Gulf of Mexico between two user groups,” reads the suit. “The challenged agency action takes fish away from the commercial sector, and gives them to the recreational fishing sector. But the recreational sector is wasteful, catching and throwing back millions of red grouper each year, of which hundreds of thousands die. Allocating more fish to the recreational sector will increase this waste, reduce the amount of fish available for consumption, and increase the risk of overfishing the stock. These outcomes are unlawful.”

The Gulf Coast Seafood Alliance (GCSA) made their opinions on NOAA’s decision very clear in an analysis that can be found here. Meanwhile, the recently filed lawsuit can be found here.

Read the full story at Seafood News

Gulf of Mexico commercial fishing groups sue US government over red grouper reallocation

May 11, 2022 — Gulf of Mexico commercial-fishing groups have filed suit against the U.S. government, alleging a reallocation of red grouper catch shares illegally favors the recreational-fishing sector.

The lawsuit, filed Friday, 6 May, challenges the National Marine Fisheries Service’s implementation of Amendment 53, which was announced on Monday, 2 May and which is set to come into effect 1 June, 2022. The new rule amends the fishery management plan for reef fish resources in the Gulf of Mexico so that the allocation of the red grouper catch to the commercial sector is lowered from 76 percent to 59.3 percent, while increasing the recreational catch-share from 24 percent to 40.7 percent.

Read the full story at SeafoodSource

NOAA ruling on red grouper catch in the Gulf announced

May 10, 2022 — The commercial allocation of the Gulf of Mexico red grouper catch will shrink starting June 1 while the recreational sector’s share will increase.

NOAA Fisheries announced the final rule under Amendment 53 on May 2, allocating 59.3 percent of the annual catch to the commercial sector (down from 76 percent) and increasing the recreational allocation from 24 percent to 40.7 percent.

But there’s a twist. The day after NOAA announced the new commercial allocation reduction, it proposed a slight increase in total annual catch limit for red grouper in the Gulf from 4.26 million pounds to 4.96 million pounds (gutted weight), including a boost in the commercial catch limit from 2.53 million pounds to 2.94 million pounds. The recreational catch limit would rise from 1.73 million pounds to 2.02 million pounds. The agency is accepting public comment through May 18.

Read the full story at National Fisherman

Gulf Coast Seafood Alliance Supports Lawsuit Challenging Unlawful Red Grouper Quotas

May 9, 2022 — The following was released by the Gulf Coast Seafood Alliance:

Commercial fishermen and members of the Gulf of Mexico seafood industry have filed a lawsuit challenging the legality of a recent decision by NOAA Fisheries to reallocate red grouper quota to recreational fishermen at the expense of the commercial fishery. The Gulf Coast Seafood Alliance (GCSA) supports the efforts by the Gulf of Mexico Reef Fish Shareholders’ Alliance, Southern Offshore Fishing Association, and A.P. Bell Fish Company to challenge this decision, in an effort to restore a fair allocation for commercial fishermen.

The lawsuit, filed late on Friday in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, challenges recent red grouper allocations approved by NOAA as part of Amendment 53 to the Fishery Management Plan for the Reef Fish Resources of the Gulf of Mexico.

The plaintiffs indicated they will seek expedited review.

Amendment 53 drastically reallocates the quota for red grouper. It increases the recreational share of the quota from 24 percent to 40.7 percent, while decreasing the commercial share from 76 percent to 59.3 percent. Simultaneously, the Amendment decreases the overall available red grouper quota in order to account for increased grouper discards from the recreational fishermen.

According to the lawsuit, this allocation “unlawfully benefit[s] the recreational fishing sector, harm[s] the commercial fishing sector and seafood consumers, and jeopardize[s] conservation,” while going against the conservation goals set out in the Magnuson-Stevens Act, the federal law governing U.S. fishery management. It notes that the Amendment is only the latest in a series of decisions showing “unlawful favoritism” to recreational fishermen.

GCSA has previously criticized Amendment 53 in its own analysis. GCSA specifically has criticized the Amendment for the flaws in the process that led to its adoption, the inadequate economic analysis that supported its allocation decision, and the legal precedents that the Amendment violates.

The complaint specifies ten causes of action, demonstrating that Amendment 53 violates:

Magnuson-Stevens Act National Standard Four, which requires that allocations of fishing privileges “shall be…fair and equitable to all such [U.S.] fishermen” and “reasonably calculated to promote conservation.”
Magnuson-Stevens Act National Standard Nine, which requires that “[c]onservation and management measures shall, to the extent practicable, (A) minimize bycatch and (B) to the extent bycatch cannot be avoided, minimize the mortality of such bycatch.”
Magnuson-Stevens Act Section 303(a)(11), which requires that any Fishery Management Plan “establish a standardized reporting methodology to assess the amount and type of bycatch occurring in the fishery, and include conservation and management measures that, to the extent practicable and in the following priority—(A) minimize bycatch; and (B) minimize the mortality of bycatch which cannot be avoided.”
Magnuson-Stevens Act Section 303(a)(15), which requires all Fishery Management Plans to “establish a mechanism for specifying annual catch limits in the plan (including a multiyear plan) implementing regulations, or annual specifications, at a level that overfishing does not occur in the fishery, including measures to ensure accountability.”
Magnuson-Stevens Act National Standard One, which requires that “[c]onservation and management measures shall prevent overfishing while achieving, on a continuing basis, the optimum yield from each fishery for the United States fishing industry.”
Legal requirements regarding the setting and review of optimum yield as specified in Magnuson- Stevens Act Sections 303(a)(3), 303(a)(4)(A), AND 302(h)(5).
Magnuson-Stevens Act National Standard Two, which requires that “conservation and management measures shall be based upon the best scientific information available.”
Magnuson-Stevens Act National Standard Eight, which requires that NOAA must “take into account the importance of fishery resources to fishing communities.”
The Administrative Procedure Act (APA).
The National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA).

Gulf of Mexico Reef Fish Shareholders’ Alliance: Statement on Red Grouper Quota Instability

Florida red grouper quota reallocation angers commercial-fishing sector

May 6, 2022 — A reallocation of the Gulf of Mexico red grouper catch limits has angered the region’s commercial fishing sector, which stands to lose a sizeable portion of its share of the catch to recreational anglers.

Amendment 53, which was announced by NOAA on Monday, 2 May, and which will go into effect 1 June, 2022, amends the fishery management plan for reef fish resources in the Gulf of Mexico so that the allocation of the red grouper catch to the commercial sector is lowered from 76 percent to 59.3 percent, while increasing the recreational catch-share from 24 percent to 40.7 percent.

Read the full story at SeafoodSource

Gulf of Mexico Reef Fish Shareholders’ Alliance: Statement on Red Grouper Quota Instability

May 5, 2022 — The following was released by the Gulf of Mexico Reef Fish Shareholders’ Alliance:

On Monday, May 2, 2022, NOAA Fisheries published a Final Rule for Reef Fish Amendment 53, which reduced the commercial sector’s allocation of the red grouper quota from 76% to 59.3%.

Yesterday, on Tuesday, May 3, 2022, NOAA Fisheries published a Proposed Rule to Modify Red Grouper Catch Limits that would, if implemented, slightly increase red grouper catch limits based on a new interim analysis (IA) that indicated a slight improvement in the health status of red grouper since 2019.

While a positive step, this latest action doesn’t fix the damage caused by Amendment 53. In fact, exacerbates it.

Without the reallocation under Amendment 53, commercial fishermen should be receiving 76% of the new proposed 4.96 million pound annual catch limit (ACL) – which would have been an approximately 600,000 pound increase from the 2021 quota. Instead, under the two actions NOAA Fisheries took this week, commercial fishermen will be limited to a 2.94 million pound ACL and 2.79 million pound Annual Catch Target (ACT). This reduction represents a significant loss in commercial fishing access, millions of dollars in lost revenue to commercial fishing families, and hundreds of thousands fewer grouper servings available for the seafood-consuming public.

Furthermore, this new 2.79 million pound quota is still 210,000 pounds less than the quota level commercial fishermen were operating under prior to Amendment 53.

In reality, commercial fishermen have lost even more than that. Reallocation to the recreational sector under Amendment 53 increases dead discards and commercial fishermen are forced to fish under a reduced catch limit to cover those discards. So commercial fishermen are penalized twice: first by the reallocation, and second by lower overall catch limits to offset increased recreational discards. In essence, commercial fishermen now have a smaller piece of a smaller pie as a result of Amendment 53. If the allocation remained 76% commercial, fewer red grouper would be thrown overboard dead, and the catch level increase under the IA would be even larger than what is in this Proposed Rule.

Simply put – Amendment 53 is the “gift” that keeps on taking. Commercial fishermen were penalized in Amendment 53 through a reduction in quota and now they are on the hook for subsidizing an even greater amount of recreational dead discards that could undo the progress this stock has made since 2019. The proportional losses through Amendment 53 will carry on in perpetuity as the recreational sector wastes more red grouper by throwing them overboard dead.

The forthcoming slight quota increase, while generally a positive sign for the red grouper population, does not restore the commercial quota to the level it was in recent years and falls far short of what the commercial sector and seafood consumers would have access to without the reallocation from Amendment 53.

To be clear – we will give credit where credit is due, and we want to thank NOAA Fisheries for conducting this rapid IA in response to repeated concerns by commercial fishermen about the years-long process translating the results of a stock assessment into management, and the need for more real-time data collection and science-based decision making.

But this marginal quota increase does nothing to solve the fundamental reallocation and recreational mismanagement problems (dead discards, lack of census-based reporting) that landed us here in the first place.

NOAA’s Red Grouper Reallocation Decision Has Industry Up in Arms and Businesses Worried

May 4, 2022 — On Monday NOAA published Amendment 53, a new rule in the Federal Register regarding the reef fish fishery of the Gulf of Mexico. The final rule revises the annual catch limits (ACLs) and annual catch targets (ACTs) for both the commercial and recreational sectors, reallocating 20% of the commercial red grouper quota to the recreational sector, a 32% decrease from what would have been allocated without the amendment.

As the final rule notes, red grouper in the Gulf exclusive economic zone (EEZ) are found primarily in the eastern Gulf on offshore hard bottom areas and are managed as a single stock with commercial and recreational ACLs and ACTs. The allocation of the ACL between the commercial and recreational sectors was 76% commercial and 24% recreational. However, the final rule revises the ACLs and ACTs for the Gulf red grouper stock. The current commercial ACL and ACT are 3.16 million lb (1.43 million kg) and 3.00 million lb (1.36 million kg), respectively. Meanwhile, the current recreational ACL and ACT are 1.00 million ln. (0.45 million kg) and 0.92 million lb (0.42 million kg) in Marine Recreational Information Program (MRIP) Coastal Household Telephone Survey (CHTS) units, respectively. In MRIP Fishery Effort Survey (FES) units, the current recreational ACL and ACT are estimated to be 2.10 million lb (0.95 million kg) and 1.93 million lb (0.88 million kg), respectively.

“As explained previously, the ABC associated with the preferred allocation is 4.26 million lb (1.93 million kg) and the total ACL is equal to the ABC,” the new rule states. “Applying the allocation selected by the Council in Amendment 53 to the total ACL results in a 2.53 million lb. (1.15 million kg) commercial ACL and a 1.73 million lb (0.78 million kg) recreational ACL in MRIP FES units.”

Read the full story at Seafood News

NOAA puts limit on red grouper harvest for commercial fishermen, prices may soon soar

May 4, 2022 — At the Star Fish Company fish market in Cortez in Manatee County, the price for a pound of red grouper is $24.95 – which may seem a bit pricey, but could be a bargain in the near future.

Karen Bell owns the market and is president of her family’s business, A.P. Bell Fish Company. It’s a commercial fishing company that’s been around for more than 80 years.

NOAA Fisheries recently announced it is reducing the number of fish that commercial fishermen can bring in, due to the increasing number of fish recreational fishermen are harvesting.

Bell says that new limit will no doubt impact the price of the fish.

“What this does is push prices even higher,” Bell said. “Grouper already is a really high-end product and the prices are crazy high.”

Andy Strelcheck, the regional administrator for NOAA, knows the decision to limit catches is not popular with everyone.

“This has been a very controversial action,” said Strelcheck. “The commercial harvest is being reduced by approximately 20 percent from the previous catch levels. Today, ironically, we just published another rule that will increase red grouper catch levels if that rule goes through.”

Read the full story at WFLA