August 18, 2014 — It would be nice to think that, in the wake of an “unscheduled” stock assessment that conspicuously left out any input from fishermen or others inherently familiar with the industry, the planned “peer review” of the findings by NOAA’s NFSC would include someone who represents the fishermen’s interests before there is any move to carry out even more dire limit cuts for Gulf of Maine cod.
Sadly, however, the peer review panel pulled together by the New England Fisheries Management Council shows no outreach whatsoever toward the industry that is already caught in a recognized economic disaster — and one that was declared even prior to NOAA’s 78-percent cod limit cut in the spring of 2013.
The “peers,” instead, will include at least two scientists who work closely with NOAA’s science arms, and thus could be seen as having every reason to back the center’s findings.
The panel will be headed by Pat Sullivan, who also serves as the vice chair of the NEFMC’s scientific and statistical committee, and includes Chris Legault from the population dynamics branch of NOAA Fisheries Northeast Fisheries Science Center — both of whom have every reason to uphold the study’s findings.
Read the full opinion from the Gloucester Daily Times