Saving Seafood

OPINION: It’s time to stop Russian interference in Alaska’s fishing industry

September 18, 2024 — From its rich history to its vibrant ecosystem and deep cultural identity, Alaska has always fascinated me. As a native Icelander, the communities and natural resources of Alaska have wowed me since my first visit. It’s profound beauty greatly reminds me of my home country.

From my work and travels in Alaska for more than two decades, one aspect is clear — the seafood industry is critical. With nearly 10% of the state’s population working in seafood and the industry generating more than $5 billion per year — this industry is the lifeblood of Alaska.

However, the Alaska seafood industry faces many challenges, including the impact of global climate change. Some of these obstacles are nearly impossible to overcome but one of them is solvable: stopping the Russian misinformation machine and the illegal flow of Russian seafood, while protecting America’s food supply.

Anchorage Daily News

Russian, Chinese fishing vessels barred from US port services

September 13, 2024 — Fishing vessels registered with China, Russia, Mexico and a host of other nations will no longer be able to refuel or resupply at U.S. ports starting next month, federal environmental regulators said this week.

The port denials, issued by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, come after the agency identified more than a dozen nations with vessels that have engaged in illegal, unreported or unregulated fishing activities — some of which has affected sharks and endangered marine life.

In a statement Tuesday, NOAA said that its decision to pull port privileges for the designated nations is the result of a two-year consultation process with each country.

“We encourage them to address the issues and improve their fisheries management and enforcement practices,” the agency wrote. Because the nations in question failed to take corrective action, NOAA considers them “negatively certified” and revoked port privileges.

Read the full article at the Courthouse News Service

EU considering sanctions against Russian seafood; Russia plans to denounce, potentially leave ICES

August 5, 2024 — The European Union is reportedly considering new sanctions against seafood of Russian origin as the divide between the bloc and the country grows.

German publication Die Welt reported the E.U. is considering new sanctions against Russian seafood, including Russian pollock. The E.U. already banned a number of Russian seafood items in a sanctions package in 2022, including items like crustaceans and caviar, but pollock was still allowed.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

How to Prevent Conflict Over an Increasingly Scarce Resource

July 12, 2024 — In 2012, British and French scallop fishers clashed in a series of violent encounters, dubbed the “great scallop war” in the press. The conflict did not escalate beyond rammed boats and thrown rocks, but it heightened tensions between the two governments, and when Brexit went into effect in 2020, a majority of French fishers were banned from operating in British territorial waters. This year, after the United Kingdom banned bottom trawling to protect fragile marine habitats, the French government protested vehemently and threatened to respond with punitive trade measures. Clashes are happening in other parts of the world, too. In 2022, when a U.S. Coast Guard cutter approached to inspect a Chinese squid vessel near Ecuador—following established legal protocols—the Chinese ship used aggressive maneuvers to avoid being boarded. In the meantime, dozens of other vessels fled without being inspected.

In a world consumed with wars in Ukraine and the Middle East—and a potential conflict over Taiwan—these incidents may seem insignificant. But although they may fly under the radar, disputes over fisheries have the potential to turn into larger conflicts and to exacerbate existing ones, just as disputes over oil, water, and grain have done in the past. Fisheries are finite natural resources that provide sustenance to billions of people; seafood constitutes nearly one-fifth of global consumption of animal protein. Its products are among the world’s most highly traded food commodities. The fisheries sector employs hundreds of millions of people and fuels the economies of many developing countries and small island states. And the industry already faces growing pressure as overfishing, poor management, and climate change degrade fish stocks across the planet. Rising ocean temperatures alone are expected to push nearly one in four local fish populations to cross an international boundary in the coming decade, reshuffling access to this critical resource and incentivizing risky illegal fishing and labor abuse in the sector. It is not hard to imagine how, in this context, a fish-related fight could spiral.

In fact, skirmishes are already happening with alarming frequency. Fights over fish are not new: during the Cold War, for instance, countries that were otherwise aligned clashed frequently over fisheries. In 1979, Canada seized U.S. fishing boats in a dispute about albacore tuna, and the Cod Wars of the 1970s saw Iceland and the United Kingdom clash over fishing rights in the North Atlantic. But the frequency of confrontation over fishery resources has increased 20-fold since 1970, and the rapid growth of fishing fleets able to travel to distant waters has further raised the risk of serious clashes.

Read the full article at Foreign Affairs

US senators, fishing industry level criticism at MSC for continued presence in Russia

July 10, 2024 — U.S. senators and key figures in the U.S. seafood industry are criticizing the Marine Stewardship Council’s (MSC) decision to continue allowing Russian fisheries – particularly Russian pollock – to keep their certifications in the face of economic sanctions.

Following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the MSC announced it planned to continue to certify Russian pollock so long as it followed through on a plan to conduct more sustainable fishing. Other areas of the Russian pollock industry would go on to gain further MSC certification, but the MSC added at the time that the ongoing war would impact its certification of Russian fisheries, as some assurance providers’ work in the country became difficult.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

New Evidence of Seasonal and Temperature-Driven Movement of Alaska Pollock across the U.S.-Russia Maritime Boundary

June 22, 2024 — Scientists placed specially designed moorings, equipped with sonar, on the seafloor to acoustically monitor pollock abundance and movements between U.S. and Russian waters. They found that a substantial amount of pollock travel between the two exclusive economic zones (EEZs) seasonally.

The study was conducted from summer 2019 to summer 2020. During this time, pollock moved southeast over the maritime boundary in winter as the sea ice formed. They were largely absent in late spring when ocean temperatures were near freezing and the sea ice was still present. They subsequently migrated northwest in late spring and early summer as waters warmed. The extent of the movement between EEZs) appears to be partially driven by water temperature.

When the moorings were deployed in summer 2019 the area was unusually warm. Following the winter migration into U.S. waters, conditions were cooler in summer 2020. Over the year of observations, 2.3 times more pollock moved into the U.S. EEZ in fall and winter then exited during the subsequent spring and summer. Scientists believe the cooler conditions in 2020 led to fewer pollock moving into Russian waters than had the previous year.

“There are some important implications for pollock management,” said Robert Levine, physical scientist and lead author on a new paper published in the ICES Journal of Marine Science. “Our research suggests that in years when water temperatures are warmer than average, the proportion of fish moving across the boundary will be greater.”

Scientists suspect that continued warming in the eastern Bering Sea will increase the proportion of the pollock stock found in Russian waters. Currently, pollock support the top U.S. commercial fishery, which harvests more than 1 million metric tons annually.

Read the full article at NOAA Fisheries 

ALASKA: Alaska’s seafood industry is in trouble. Processors and policymakers blame Russia.

June 4, 2024 — Alaska waters produce the most seafood in the country, and many of the state’s coastal communities depend on commercial fisheries to sustain their economy.

But Alaska’s fisheries are facing a massive economic slump right now, and policymakers are increasingly blaming flooded global markets. The private sector and federal policymakers are teaming up to try to stop the bleeding.

Last year was brutal for the seafood industry. Processing companies and fishermen alike suffered amid cratering prices, and they blamed Russia for flooding markets. Republican U.S. Sen. Dan Sullivan, from Alaska, pointed his finger at the country at a news conference on May 23.

“Russians have essentially admitted they’re not just at war in Ukraine, they’re at war with the American fishing industry,” he said.

Alaska’s other federal delegates, Sen. Lisa Murkowski and Rep. Mary Peltola, shared similar sentiments at ComFish, a fisheries trade show in Kodiak.

The U.S. and Russia have been fighting over their seafood trade for years.

Recent highlights include a Russian ban on American goods in 2014.

The U.S. government didn’t put its own ban on Russian goods in place until Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022.

Despite that embargo, there was a loophole in the U.S. restrictions, at least for seafood. Russian-caught fish processed in third-party countries, namely China, could still be sold in American markets.

That lasted until late last year. Then, amid intense lobbying from the U.S. seafood industry, President Joe Biden signed an executive order that finally closed the loophole and any chances for Russian fish getting to America.

The move could boost demand for Alaska fish in the U.S., but America is just one of three major markets for Alaska seafood — it’s sold all over the world.

Read the full article at Alaska Public Media

Alaska Senator Dan Sullivan Talks ‘Fish’ to Local Fishermen

April 23, 2024 — When you think of “free fish,” you’re likely to remember those generous fishermen who dropped a fresh silver salmon on your doorstep or loaded your freezer with offerings of halibut, cod and crab.

But when Senator Dan Sullivan (R-Alaska) uses the term, it’s in the context of “Communist fish,” which he links to Russia (the former Soviet Union) and China.

Appearing at two ComFish events last weekend, Sullivan touted some of the work he and his colleagues have been doing in Washington, D.C., including the passage of legislation that placed an embargo on Russian fish products coming into this country.

“It took too damn long, but we finally got it done,” he said, to applause.

To no avail, Sullivan and his colleagues tried to get the Obama and Trump administrations to put an embargo on imported Russian fish.

After the Russian invasion of Ukraine, when the Biden administration was putting together “a big sanctions package, I went to the White House and said, ‘Now is the time to fix this to a level playing field.’ To their credit they did it. It took a war to fix this,” Sullivan said.

Read the full article at Seafoodnews.com

ALASKA: Russian objection to U.S. territorial claims off Alaska complicates maritime relationship

April 9, 2024 — New U.S. claims to seabed territory off Alaska have run into an obstacle: an objection from the Russian government.

The Russian government, which has staked territorial claims to most of the Arctic Ocean, is challenging the U.S. claims made in December to sovereignty over 520,400 square kilometers of extended outer continental shelf in the Arctic Ocean – an area bigger than California — and another 176,330 square kilometers in the Bering Sea.

The U.S. does not have the right to make such claims because it is not a party to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, Russia’s delegation argued at a meeting in Jamaica last month of the International Seabed Commission.

“We categorically reject the selective approach of the United States of America to the use of international law, with an emphasis on its rights and a complete disregard for obligations,” the delegation’s statement said.

U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, said the Russian objection is puzzling because the claims made in December by the U.S. State Department did not overlap any territory claimed by Russia.

The following was relased by the Alaska Public Media