December 26, 2012 – The New England Fishery Management Council made the right call last week in backing a request from the Gloucester-based Northeast Seafood Coalition asking whether a one-year interim reprieve on what loom as apocalyptic catch limits for Gloucester’s and the region’s groundfish industry can be extended for another year.
And it’s encouraging to learn that John Bullard, NOAA’s first-year Northeast regional administrator, is at least considering that option as well.
For NOAA and the Department of Commerce must consider that limit cuts of 70 percent or more for Gulf of Maine cod and other stocks — triggered, in large part, by provisions of the Magnuson-Stevens Act — would essentially shutdown the cod and other fisheries, with fishermen lacking the allowable quota to make even a single day trip worthwhile.
Read the complete editorial from The Gloucester Times.