The Obama administration has arranged to tap the financial resources of the private philanthropic sector to supplement the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration budget, if necessary, in order to complete a radical restructuring of the nation’s commercial fishing industry.
The goal is to convert the competitive system into one of assigned rights.
But the audacity of this hands-on industrial policy leads into the unknown — from an unstable system of exasperating frustration and unpleasant surprises for fishermen, but a slow, steady recovery of the fish stocks.
And the identity of NOAA’s private partner, a hybrid charity which has multiple Big Oil partners for financial support, has created unease in the fishing industry, where oil exploration is viewed as a lurking competitor for the best fishing grounds.