August 3, 2016 — In what one advocate called “a potential sea change” for the commercial fishing industry, NOAA Fisheries announced intentions Tuesday to shift all or part of long-controversial stock surveys from its Bigelow research vessel to commercial boats, saying a transition over the next five years could bring “greater shared confidence” in survey results.
“We have to learn to work better with the (commercial fishing) industry — we have to open up better lines of communication,” Dr. Bill Karp, director of NOAA’s Northeast Fisheries Science Center in Woods Hole, said of the transition.
How fish stocks are measured has been one of the biggest points of contention for years between governmental regulators and commercial fishermen, as survey results affect seasonal catch limits, quotas for various species and more. The latest questions about NOAA’s Henry R. Bigelow research ship arose this spring, for example, when maintenance problems delayed NOAA’s spring survey from April to June.
Don Cuddy, program director for the Center for Sustainable Fisheries in New Bedford, said fishermen also have felt the Bigelow is unable to accurately count “flatfish,” such as yellowtail flounder, because of the type of gear it tows.
“Yellowtail flounder are critical to the scallop industry as well as the groundfish,” Cuddy said, explaining that low quotas for yellowtail can force scallopers to prematurely stop operations, if they incidentally snag too many yellowtail as a bycatch.
Cuddy said enabling commercial boats to participate in NOAA surveys — and placing government scientists on the same boats as fishermen — could help “close the credibility gap” that has long surrounded survey results.