University of Alaska Archives

JOHN SACKTON: Alaska’s Fisheries No Longer the Gold Standard, as Budget Fiasco Threatens Research and Management

July 15, 2019 — SEAFOOD NEWS — For nearly 40 years, Alaska has been the gold standard in Global Fisheries. State management brought wild salmon back from the brink of commercial extinction in many rivers, so that today Bristol Bay, for example, is consistently producing bigger runs than in the past 100 years.

State management also lived by a few broad principles. Fisheries sustainability was written into the Alaska constitution. And decisions were guided by science. Further, the active fisheries management of NOAA and the ADF&G rested on a foundation of broad support. This included research at the University of Alaska, the Sea Grant Program, ASMI, and the revenue sharing from fish taxes with local communities.

Now much of that infrastructure is under attack. Despite a $600 million surplus, radical Governor Dunleavy has vetoed 181 items in the budget, totaling over $400 million, in an effort to provide a $3000 entitlement to Alaskans from the permanent fund, rather than $1600 as the legislature proposed.

The legislature is so paralyzed, it cannot even meet in one city. A rump faction is camped in Wasilla, the majority continues to meet in Juneau, but because Alaska requires the highest override margin in the country (75%) the Juneau legislators have not been able to muster a veto override.

“I cannot fathom why the governor is purposely throwing Alaska into a severe economic recession,” said Sen. Natasha von Imhof, R-Anchorage. “It would be one thing if we didn’t have the revenue. But we do. We have plenty of money. After the Legislature spent five months creating a sensible and intelligent budget, we ended up with a $600 million surplus. The governor is cutting the budget not because we are in a fiscal crisis. It is to distribute nearly $2 billion to Alaskans to the detriment of core government services like public safety, roads and education.”

Economists have testified for months that if these vetoes go through, it will crash the state’s economy back into recession.

This fiasco in Alaskan government does not bode well for fisheries.

Alaska today is like the family bequeathed a once magnificent mansion, but now with squabbling relatives too poor to keep it up. Signs of decay and disrepair are appearing more each year.

From afar, things still look great. Bristol Bay is strong. Southeast Alaska is seeing more salmon. Cod and pollock fisheries, which face a climate related threat, are still producing. Prices are high for crab, salmon and pollock.

And in fact, in the face of huge budget cuts due to the Governor’s veto of the legislative budget this year, ADF&G is faring better than most agencies.

But the long term looks much worse.

Fisheries are under threat on two levels.

Fisheries are unique in that they are both for profit businesses, and a social endeavor. This is because the ocean and its resources are common property. But they are not fished as common property, they are fished by individuals and companies.

The basic compact is public support for the regulated economic activity of fishing, and in return, those in the business have the opportunity to thrive and grow returning money and opportunity to the state.

As Doug Vincent-Lang, Alaska’s Department of Fish and Game Commissioner told Laine Welch, “we take a $200m budget of which about $50 million is [from general funds] and we turn that into an $11 billion return to our state.”

This economic activity is underpinned by public money. Just as land-based companies could not exist without government provided roads and airports, so fisheries cannot exist without government provided science and management.

The science and management – the knowledge of what is happening with fish stocks, habitats and ecosystems, plus the resources to make and enforce decisions, are the roads and airports of the seafood industry. Without them, fisheries cannot thrive.

Because of the cost-effectiveness calculation, ADF&G has fared better than other Alaska government agencies in the face of the Governor’s vetoes. But this is a very narrow view.

The budget crisis threatens to unravel the University of Alaska, which is facing a one year immediate cut of 41% in state support. The veto takes $130 million immediately out of the University budget, while the legislative budget cut was $5 million.

The University of Alaska Anchorage could have 700 layoffs and the elimination of about 40 of its 105 degree programs. That’s a loss of at least 3,000 students.

“There are going to be ripple — tidal wave if you will — effects of that cut,” University Chancellor Johnsen said. “On enrollment and the tuition that comes with enrollment, and also on research grants and contracts because there’ll be fewer faculty out there competing for those grants and contracts, so really the $130 million, I think, is a conservative estimate for the budget impact in the current fiscal year.”

Also the budget cuts have hit ASMI, which has seen steady reductions in state support. At a time when the greatest threat to the seafood industry in Alaska is the trade war with China, ASMI is kneecapped, preventing it from acting effectively in foreign markets.

The fact is that Alaska’s fisheries are facing huge long term problems chiefly due to warming oceans and loss of sea ice. This is changing the ecosystem in the Bering Sea and means that the basis of the state’s fisheries prosperity may be under threat especially as stocks move north to cooler waters.

This is a hugely difficult problem to understand. Why have chinook catches plummeted? What is the impact of hatchery salmon on ocean survival of wild salmon? Can Dutch Harbor sustain a shore based pollock fishery when the fishing grounds move several hundred miles to the North?

All of these interactions can be unraveled by fisheries managers only with a foundation of basic science and research, and much of this is provided by faculty and staff at the University of Alaska. For example a number of them sit on various Scientific committees of the N. Pacific Management Council.

When NGO’s first began campaigns to address sustainable fishing, Alaska was held up as the gold standard because of its excellent management, strong political support for fisheries, and a track record of making decisions based on science. European fisheries, by contrast, were seen as compromised because fish were kicked around the political system like favors and patronage, and as a result, were consistently overfished.

Alaska’s political meltdown means that the government is in danger of no longer carrying out its basic public functions. One of its public functions is to provide the underpinnings of successful economic activities like fishing.

Unless this is corrected, the economic returns from Alaska fisheries will be reduced as lack of manpower reduces science based knowledge, and leads to more cautious management decisions. The market reputation of Alaska fisheries will suffer, as those consumers who care about the Alaska brand see that the state no longer can make the investments to keep it functioning at the highest level.

The biggest tragedy is that this crisis was created solely by politicians. The legislature actually passed a budget with a $600 million surplus that addressed the long term decline in oil prices that has been impacting Alaska. If the Governor’s vetoes stand, as looks likely at this time, the state will have a self-inflicted wound which will lead to more job losses, more people leaving, and lower vitality. For what public purpose?

This story was originally published on SeafoodNews.com, a subscription site. It is reprinted with permission.

Seaweed Farmers in Alaska Gear Up for Large Haul

May 29, 2019 — The largest commercial harvest of seaweed in Alaska is taking place this month.

Blue Evolution, a California-based company that cultivates, harvests and distributes Alaska-grown seaweed, is expected to haul in up to 200,000 pounds from waters near Kodiak Island within the next two weeks. Previous harvests have been a fraction of that size, but, as the mariculture industry grows in Alaska, Blue Evolution is also expanding.

Working with local resident farmers, the company produces seed from wild seaweed plants and grows them into kelp starts in an onshore hatchery at the federal government’s Alaska Fisheries Science Center Kodiak Laboratory. Blue Evolution then supplies seeded string to local farmers who plant them onto longlines in late fall, cultivate their crops during winter and harvest in spring.

The company is collaborating with the University of Alaska and Alaska Sea Grant on seaweed research aimed at developing cost-effective cultivation methods for several native species. Seaweed farming is a growing, multibillion-dollar industry worldwide and presents a new economic opportunity for coastal Alaska.

“It suits my family because we set gillnet for salmon during the summer and supplement our income with seaweed farming during winter,” said Lexa Meyer, who co-owns and operates Kodiak Kelp Co. with her husband.

Read the full story at Alaska Native News

Feds inch closer to approving Alaska mining project seen as a threat to Pacific Northwest

March 11, 2019 — Over the past several decades, fishermen, business owners, Alaska Native organizations and environmental groups have protested a proposed open-pit copper and gold mine at the headwaters of Bristol Bay — a pristine salmon habitat.

Now the federal government is inching toward approving the mining project.

Nestled in southwest Alaska, Bristol Bay is home to the world’s largest wild salmon run. The watershed supports a teeming ecosystem of eagles, grizzlies and beluga whales.

It’s also an economic engine for the Pacific Northwest. Each year, the fishery contributes thousands of seasonal fishing and processing jobs and millions of dollars in economic activity to Washington, Oregon, and California, according to the University of Alaska Institute of Social and Economic Research.

Bristol Bay is where the Pebble Limited Partnership, the company developing the mine, plans to build a 10.7-square-mile open-pit mine to dig up copper, gold, molybdenum, and other minerals. The mine would require new infrastructure, including roads, a port and a 188-mile-long natural gas pipeline.

Read the full story at McClatchy DC

JACK PAYNE: Endangered species science is itself endangered

December 19, 2018 — Catching chinook salmon today requires gear, technique, experience and luck. Catching salmon a year or a decade from now requires science.

That means local science. The recent National Climate Assessment notes that Alaska’s temperature has been warming at twice the global rate. To get at what this means for Alaskans, we need University of Alaska scientists.

Alaskans are getting a better handle on what a warming world does to salmon runs through the work of a federally funded corps of local fisheries researchers based at the University of Alaska Fairbanks. Known as the Alaska Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit, its researchers address climate questions from an Alaska perspective.

For example, they research how melting glaciers can increase or diminish salmon numbers and for how many years. They consider how the increasing frequency of wildfires plays out on salmon streams. They compare how the same conditions can have different effects on sockeye, coho and chinook salmon.

It’s not the gloom and doom of a planet in peril. In some ways, climate change appears to have boosted some salmon counts, at least temporarily.

An accurate salmon count depends in part on a good scientist count. Here, the news is not good. Until I hired Alaska assistant unit leader Abby Powell to come run the University of Florida Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit three years ago, the Alaska unit had five faculty members. It’s down to two.

Slowly starving for lack of federal funding, Alaska’s fish and wildlife species science is itself becoming an endangered species.

The national Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit (CRU) program was established in 1935 on the premise that science, not politics, should guide management of national treasures such as eagles, bison, and moose. An administration proposal to de-fund it does away with that premise.

Read the full opinion piece at Anchorage Daily News

Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute to request state funding boost

November 6, 2018 — Legislative and governor candidates have vowed across the state to further cut Alaska’s budget, but many state departments drafting their budget requests for the coming fiscal year are going in a different direction.

On Friday, the Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute became the latest state-supported agency to warn that budget cuts have reached their limit and in some places have gone too far.

In an unusual statement, the public-private partnership said it will be requesting $3.75 million more from the state in the coming year.

“There’s only so much you can do to squeeze down on the role and responsibilities of state government, and as far as others, there’s some departments looking at increments … I guess mostly in programs that will pay long-term benefits,” said Mike Navarre, commissioner of the Alaska Department of Commerce, which controls ASMI’s budget.

An “increment,” in the jargon of the state, is a budget increase.

“We used to invest in seafood marketing. We’re looking to do it again,” Navarre said.

Read the full story at the Juneau Empire

Alaska: In Nome, state experts ponder responses to Bering Sea crises

February 21, 2018 — Experts from around the state gathered in Nome to discuss marine mammals and how multiple entities can respond to different types of emergencies that may happen in the Bering Sea.

Mandy Migura with the National Marine Fisheries Service was one of the presenters at a “Strait Science” talk hosted at University of Alaska Fairbanks Northwest Campus.

Migura discussed how marine mammal stranding events take place in Alaska sporadically but have been rising in numbers since tracking began in the 1980s.

“Strandings involve live marine mammals. these may be animals that are unable to return to their natural habitat without some kind of assistance. And they may be injured, they may be entangled in gear or marine debris, they may be entrapped — ice entrapment, ice may form up and they’re in an area where they can’t get back to where they should be — or they may be disoriented, may be a health issue or something in the environment that’s affecting them.”

Migura is Alaska’s marine mammal stranding coordinator and said dead marine mammals can also be categorized as stranded.

With more cases of marine mammal strandings being reported, the Bering Sea marine ecosystem is currently in a volatile state.

Nome-based marine advisory agent Gay Sheffield mentioned how sharks have been found more frequently in the Bering Straits region, with the latest one documented in Gambell in summer 2017.

On the other side of St. Lawrence Island, a stellar sea lion was harvested last year in Savoonga, which she said is uncommon.

Migura said local and regional partners reporting this kind of information greatly benefits the National Marine Fisheries Service.

Read the full story at KTOO

A new study looks at why Pacific Cod stocks are crashing in the Gulf of Alaska

February 14, 2018 — A new study in Kodiak will hopefully shed some light on what Pacific cod go through when they’re young.

“We don’t know how they do in the winter. Where they are. What they are eating. What their energetic requirements are.”

One of the leaders of the project, Mike Litzow is a researcher for the University of Alaska Fairbanks based in Kodiak.

He said the recent crash in the Pacific cod population in the Gulf of Alaska was a wake-up call that there’s a lot to be learned about the early life stages of Pacific cod.

A few years ago a body of warm water settled in the gulf and it may have made it difficult for juvenile cod to survive.

“The operating hypothesis right now is that you can warm the temperatures up and they’ll survive if there’s enough food, but there wasn’t enough food to meet those requirements.”

The National Marine Fisheries Service, according to Litzow, recently found that the Pacific cod population had dropped by about 60 percent since 2015.

The North Pacific Fisheries Pacific Council reduced the amount of Pacific cod that can be caught by commercial fishermen in the Gulf of Alaska by about 80 percent because of the crash.

The decrease in cod will be hard for Kodiak fisherman because Pacific Cod is one of the bigger fisheries in the region.

Litzow thinks Kodiak will have to face the possibility that more fishery disasters could be in its future because of climate change.

Read the full story at KTOO

Why are Pacific Cod Stocks Crashing?

February 13, 2018 — “The status of Pacific cod is probably the biggest fishery issue facing Kodiak right now, with the quota cut 80 percent for 2018,” said Mike Litzow, a University of Alaska Fairbanks associate professor at the Kodiak Seafood and Marine Science Center.

Pacific cod stocks have collapsed, possibly because recruitment (production of young fish to enter the population) has been very low during a recent string of incredibly warm years in the Gulf of Alaska, he said.

Scientists don’t know why cod stocks are shrinking. The leading hypothesis is that warmer temperatures increase the metabolic rates of young cod, and their food sources don’t supply enough energy.

There’s a sticking point—there’s not enough data to test the theory. Studies of fish ecology and population dynamics in Alaska are overwhelmingly conducted in the summer. Almost nothing is known about wintertime ecology of juvenile Pacific cod.

To help provide answers, Litzow and fisheries oceanographer Alisa Abookire embarked on a pilot study this month to collect information about habitat use, diet and energetics of juvenile cod.

They are sampling the fish with a beach seine and taking ocean water data aboard a semi-enclosed 22 foot skiff. To stay warm they wear insulated paddling suits.

Litzow and Abookire are collaborating with scientists at the Hatfield Marine Science Center in Newport, Ore., who have been studying juvenile cod in Kodiak over the last 12 years. The pilot study is funded by the Ocean Phoenix Fund through the University of Alaska Foundation.

Read the full story at Alaska Native News

Cantwell, Huffman, Colleagues to Trump Admin: “Listen to Our Fishermen” and Save Bristol Bay from the Pebble Mine

White House plan to reverse clean water rules paves the way for construction of Pebble Mine, a catastrophic move for Bristol Bay watershed, 60 million salmon, and more than 20,000 jobs

Decision flies in the face of science and basic reason, made with no public input from fishermen or business groups

October 11, 2017 — WASHINGTON — The following was released by the office of Senator Maria Cantwell:

Today, U.S. Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA), Rep. Jared Huffman (CA-02), and 40 of their colleagues in the House and Senate sent a forceful letter to President Trump urging caution and a careful consideration of the facts before his administration removes the science-based environmental rules that protect Alaska’s Bristol Bay and the fishermen who depend on it.

Removing the existing clean water protections allows for the construction of Pebble Mine, an open-pit copper and gold mine that could have a depth equivalent to as much as two and a half Trump Towers. The mine would be an unmitigated catastrophe for the Bristol Bay watershed and the 40-60 million salmon who return to it every year. A three-year Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) study in 2014 found that the proposed mine would, even in the course of normal, safe mine operations, destroy 24 to 94 miles of salmon-producing waterways and pristine environment.

The University of Alaska Institute of Social and Economic Research found that the Bristol Bay fishery supports more than 20,000 jobs and adds $674 million of economic activity to the states of Washington, Oregon, and California. The region also supports a prolific outdoor recreation industry; anglers from around the world take roughly 37,000 fishing trips annually to Bristol Bay, generating $60 million in economic activity.

“The EPA’s plan to reverse clean water safeguards is egregious and inconsistent with science, and frankly, inconsistent with basic logic,” wrote the members of Congress. “The Pebble Mine directly threatens our maritime economy and thousands of American jobs that rely on this world class fishery. We ask you to listen to America’s fishermen and businesses and reverse EPA’s decision to undo strong protections and clean water safeguards in Bristol Bay.”

Cantwell, Huffman, and their colleagues note the process that established the current clean water safeguards were the result of rigorous scientific analysis and peer review, over one million public comments, and eight public hearings.

In stark contrast, the Trump Administration’s recent decision to roll back the protections has no scientific basis and has been carefully removed from the public eye. There has been no input from stakeholders such as the fishing, tourism, and outdoor industries. Only two public hearings have been noticed, neither of which are scheduled for Washington, Oregon or California where many Bristol Bay commercial and sports fishermen reside.

In their letter, the members of Congress also called for public hearings, a 90-day extension of the public comment period, and other transparency measures to ensure the public is allowed to make their voices heard. Restrictions on mining have the support of 90% of local Bristol Bay residents.

Senator Cantwell successfully led the fight to save Bristol Bay when Pebble Mine was first proposed. In 2011, she urged the EPA to use authority under the Clean Water Act to block large scale development in Bristol Bay. She continued the drumbeat through 2014, when she rallied supporters at Fisherman’s Terminal in Seattle to urge President Obama and the EPA to continue to prevent mining in the area.

In addition to Sen. Cantwell and Rep. Huffman, 40 additional member of Congress signed the letter including: Senators Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), Ron Wyden (D-OR), Patty Murray (D-WA), Jeff Merkley (D-OR), Kamala Harris (D-CA), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), Edward Markey (D-MA) and Representatives Suzanne Bonamici (OR-01), Earl Blumenauer (OR-03), Barbara Lee (CA-13), Grace Napolitano (CA-32), Jackie Speier (CA-14), Anna Eshoo (CA-18), William Keating (MA-09), Adam Smith (WA-09), Denny Heck (WA-10), Eleanor Holmes Norton (DC-Del.), Pramila Jayapal (WA-07), Alan Lowenthal (CA-47), Dwight Evans (PA-02), Peter DeFazio (OR-04), Zoe Lofgren (CA-19), Jamie Raskin (MD-08), Emanual Cleaver, II (MO-05), Rick Larsen (WA-02), Derek Kilmer (WA-06), Mark DeSaulnier (CA-11), Judy Chu (CA-27), Ro Khanna (CA-17), Jerry McNerney (CA-9), John Garamendi (CA-3), Suzan DelBene (WA-01), Kurt Schrader (OR-05), Jimmy Panetta (CA-20), Donald S. Beyer, Jr. (VA-08), Norma Torres (CA-35), Doris Matsui (CA-06), Ted Lieu (CA-33), Linda Sánchez (CA-38), Julia Brownley (CA-26), and Salud Carbajal (CA-24).

A copy of the letter can be found here.

ALASKA: Requesting Letters of Intent for Project Funding

August 18, 2016 — The following was released by the Pollock Conservation Cooperative Research Center:

The Pollock Conservation Cooperative Research Center (PCCRC) is requesting Letters of Intent for projects to receive funding in 2017.

PCCRC has $500,000 available to fund projects that will begin in 2017. PCCRC projects must include a PI who is associated with one of the University of Alaska campuses but may include co-PIs from other institutions or organizations.

Click here for details on how to apply and all other relevant information. The deadline for submission is September 26, 2016.