Fishing Industry Alerts

Rep. Frank and 5 other coastal congressmen urged Jane Lubchenco to fund the scallop observer program “until an appropriate set-aside management approach can ensure the proper compensation to scallop vessels and their crew.” Read the complete story.

Cate O’Keefe, a PhD student at SMAST, took the top award at the Annual Science Conference of the world’s largest marine science and advisory body, in Berlin.

In her paper, she noted that "crises in the fishing industry have caused distrust between fishers and fishery scientists" but even in the midst of crises, "fishers and scientists have found ways to work together…"  She noted that "the success of cooperative research hinges on participation from the fishing industry throughout the entirety of the research programme, from project design to data analysis." 

Over 650 marine scientists met in Berlin to discuss the status and future of the oceans. There were approximately 390 papers in the conference, and Cate’s was judged to be the best. 

Many of her colleagues anticipated that Cate had a good shot to win the ‘newcomer award’ for students, but described her winning the best presentation as "remarkable" for someone her age. 
 
In her Ph.D. studies, Cate is studying sea scallop management, and she serves as a member is a member of the New England Fishery Management Council (NEFMC) Scallop Planning Development Team (PDT). This was her first presentation at ICES, which is the primary Fisheries organization for the North Atlantic. To win the "best paper award" is outstanding. 

Read more at Saving Seafood.

Under government management,  the observer set-aside funds contributed by scallopers have run out before the end of the fishing year.  The scallop industry received neither an apology nor an offer of compensation.

Under government management,  the observer set-aside funds contributed by scallopers on all landings have been run out before the end of the fishing year.  At the New England Fisheries Management Council Scallop Committee meeting on Wednesday, the scallop industry received neither an apology nor an offer of compensation from the National Marine Fisheries Service for this government management failure.

Those in the audience with industry interests were furious. They wanted, if not an offer then at least an apology. Since the industry has been paying for the Federal observer program since 2000 and now — under government management — the funds have been depleted, they are ask ‘why can’t the government fund the program for the rest of the fishing season?’  During the question and answer period, Drew Minkiewicz, an attorney who represents the Fishermen Survival Fund pointed out that observation is a federal activity, and accordingly this request was not extraordinary.

At the Crown Plaza—where the scallop committee meeting was held, Regional Office staffer Hannah Goodale, mentioned two words: ‘transparency’ and ‘communication’. She said that NMFS wanted to improve the Regional Office’s communication with the Science Center. She also spoke about making the set-aside program more transparent—for next year—giving the industry information on what is available in the actual set-aside program, as well as the goals of the program.

Industry observers said that there is no reason to wait until next year for increased transparency.

Read the complete story at Saving Seafood.

The interim report is undergoing a 30-day public review and comment period.  According to the task force "This report provides proposals for a comprehensive national approach to uphold our stewardship responsibilities and ensure accountability for our actions. Additionally, the report outlines a more balanced, productive and sustainable approach to our ocean resources."


The report is available from the White House website at:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/assets/documents/09_17_09_Interim_Report_of_Task_Force_FINAL2.pdf



There is a public meeting of the task force scheduled in New England:
September 24, 2009 – Providence, RI
If you cannot attend the meeting in person:
View the live webcast Call in to the listen-only phone line:
United States: (866) 658-7997 (up to 100 lines); Participant code: 4319624
International: (517) 833-7464; Participant code: 4319624

The Scallop Oversight Committee of the NEFMC is to hear an explanation from NMFS on how the Observer Set-Aside Program has run out in three instances.

In a letter dated Sept. 1, NOAA Fisheries Service announced that the 2009 Open Area Observer Days-at-Sea (DAS) Set-aside has been fully utilized. Therefore, for any Open Area scallop trip departing after 0001 hours, September 9, 2009 on which NOAA randomly mandates that an observer must on board, NMFA has informed vessels that they must bear the cost of that observer without compensation.  This cost is in addition to making continuing contributions to the set-aside programs. 

Saving Seafood has received numerous inquiries regarding this situation, controlling regulations, and government policy. Our contributing writer John Lee has researched the situation and files a story providing background.

The Scallop Oversight Committee of the New England Fisheries Management Council has added the agenda item “Report on recent issues with industry funded observer program and discuss possible improvements” to the Committee’s Wednesday, September 16 meeting at 3 p.m. at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Warwick, RI. The meeting is public. 

Read the complete story

On August 25, five New Bedford vessels return to fishing after a weekend in port due to Hurricane Bill.  As they head to sea, they will stop in Vineyard Haven at noon, to welcome the Obama family, and to call attention to the challenges facing our fishing fleet.

Boats will welcome the Obamas; point out concerns of fishing fleet

August 24, 2009 – New Bedford, MA — The fishing fleet of New Bedford, Massachusetts – one of America’s oldest and it’s most profitable fishing port — welcomes the President and the Obama family to Martha’s Vineyard, and to the waters where we work each day.

On Tuesday, August 25, ten New Bedford vessels return to fishing after a weekend in port due to Hurricane Bill.  As they head to sea, they will stop in Vineyard Haven at noon, to welcome the Obama family, and to call attention to the challenges facing our fishing fleet.

We hope as the Obamas enjoy their vacation, they will eat some of our famous New England seafood.  And we trust that given the President’s concern for working families, he will remember the fishermen.  These small business owners risk their lives at sea to put food on American tables, provide for their families, and create jobs.  They pump a billion dollars into the Massachusetts economy every year. And they face an increasingly complex web of NOAA government management measures which restrict their ability to fish while provideing little or no benefit to the fish stocks they target.

Current Regulations Are Failing

Current regulations have failed the fish and the fishermen, sending vessels to sea during hazardous weather conditions to meet arbitrary deadlines, and forcing fishermen to throw thousands of pounds of good fish overboard to stay under trip limits.

The most recent statistics (http://www.nero.noaa.gov/ro/fso/mul.htm) show that of the twelve species New England groundfish fishermen harvest, regulations prevented catching the conservation catch target for ten of the twelve species. The conservation catch target is the amount of fish that federal scientists determine may be removed sustainably from a stock of fish each year.  Only white hake and monkfish were caught at levels close to the target.

The total conservation catch target for the twelve groundfish species was almost 170 thousand metric tons. The total catch was less than 43 thousand tons. Assuming a conservative estimate of a dollar a pound, this represents over a billion dollars lost to the New England economy, and lost primarily to New England’s struggling fishing communities.

Science and Limits Have Been Questionable

NOAA scientists base conservation catch target limits on stock estimates, but their science has often been less than credible. And when the government scientists undercount, that means more and tighter restrictions on fishermen than what is needed to protect our oceans. In 2002, in an incident dubbed "Trawlgate", fishermen discovered that NOAA’s survey vessel was running with its nets misaligned and lopsided, allowing fish to escape and leading scientists to conclude there were fewer fish in the sea. .  In 2003, University of Massachusetts Dartmouth scientists proved that NOAA’s estimates of the scallop biomass were 50% lower than they actually were.  Today the north Atlantic scallop fishery is among our nation’s healthiest and most profitable. Had it been left in the hands of government scientists, we might still be underfishing this resource.

First Estimates of Limits Appear Unworkable

Last week, preliminary recommendations for the Pollock catch limit suggest a possible cut of 67% from current limits.  Pollock is a less desirable relative of cod, often used in fish sticks and breaded cutlets. Because it is hard to avoid catching Pollock when fishing for haddock, cod and other species, and because by-catch will be included in Catch Share hard limits, industry leaders believe this reduction alone may make Catch Share management unworkable.

A Blind Leap into an uncertain future

In an effort to improve regulation, the Obama Administration has made the shift to "catch share management" the cornerstone of its fisheries policy. NOAA Administrator Jane Lubchenco, and several environmentalist organizations have advocated this management system.  Under catch shares, fishing vessels are granted percentages of the total allowable catch.  In the northeast, they will do this by grouping into “sectors”, private corporations representing groups of vessels that will be granted quotas.

This represents the most significant change in fisheries management in the United States since 1976; a change as dramatic as the 200 mile limit and the establishment of the Hague Line, under which a significant portion of Georges Bank was deeded to Canada by the U.S. Government. And while the 1976 law was created by Congressional action and Presidential signature, this change is being enacted by a government agency, by fiat.

Catch Share management might well improve the regulatory framework that we work under.  But the move to Catch Shares in the New England groundfish fishery is taking place so fast, that fishermen are being asked to join sectors September 1st, even though the rules and regulations and quotas won’t be set until late this year or possibly in 2010.  We are being asked to take a blind leap into an uncertain future. The government is replacing a system that we know has failed, with one that we hope will work. This change will force an unprecedented social transition for our fishermen without a solid understanding of the consequences.

Privatizing Ocean Resources

Catch Shares management is described by its proponents as giving “fishermen a stake in fisheries and an incentive to conserve fish.”  This may prove to be true.  However, catch shares work by granting access to a secure share of the total allowed catch to individual fishermen, communities or fishery associations.  

As such, this represents one of the largest transfers of public resources to the private sector in American history.  And this is taking place without in-depth analysis and public discussion. 

Most analyses of Catch Share management anticipate that some fishermen will be squeezed out by economic forces, will no longer have the opportunity to fish, and will lose their livelihood.

We are concerned that Catch Shares will create the opportunity for significant monied interests from outside the commercial fishing industry to buy up the vast majority of fishing permits. These interests might not be local and might be foreign.  Our nation has seen farm policies that led to the loss of the family farm in agriculture.  We fear the loss of the family-owned boat in fishing.

Our fisheries management law requires “taking into account the social and economic needs of the States.” [Magnuson-Stevens Act (2)(b)(5), Public Law 101-627].  Over the years, the National Marine Fisheries Service has prioritized environmental goals over the needs of working families.  The law requires balance between the environment and our economy.  As we move to Catch Share management, we ask that NOAA obey this law.

This is an unprecedented step in managing our fisheries. We ask for the time to realistically examine the management options that we have, and to make the decisions that will determine the future complexion of our businesses, our communities and of one of our oldest fisheries in a measured and well-reasoned manner.  

We are concerned about a blind rush to meet an arbitrary timeframe, which is what we are now being forced by the National Marine Fisheries Service to do. Almost all of the groundfish stocks are rebuilding. The delay of a year or two in implementing catch shares – or choosing another path – isn’t going to change the rebuilding of these species.

Fishing vessels participating in the visit to Martha’s Vineyard include:

F/V Blue Seas

F/V Neves

F/V Sancor

F/V Northern Crusader

F/V Green Acres

F/V Stars of the Sea

F/V Lady Patricia

F/V Sea Explorer

F/V Morue

F/V Mischief

In the past 72 hours, two scallop surveys, one from NOAA and one from UMass’ SMAST have become available, both showing strong numbers on Georges Bank. Details on the two surveys and press accounts are available on the Saving Seafood website.

SURVEY INFO:

SMAST: Scallop Video Survey Shows Stock Remains Strong
The University of Massachusetts Dartmouth School for Marine Science and Technology (SMAST) has completed their cooperative sea scallop video survey and presented the results to the New England Fisheries Management Council?s Scallops Plan Development Team.

NOAA: Annual Survey Shows High Numbers of Seed Scallops on Georges Bank
A NOAA Fisheries scallop survey off the northeastern coast between North Carolina and Massachusetts shows high numbers of juvenile "recruit" sea scallops and ocean quahogs on Georges Bank tempered with weak numbers for seed scallops in the Mid-Atlantic for 2009. This survey, which included the first successful use of a scallop dredge and high resolution underwater imaging system from the same vessel, also shows the overall biomass for the Mid-Atlantic remains high.

PRESS ACCOUNTS:

Boston Globe: Young scallop numbers are rising
A survey of the sea scallop population off the Eastern seaboard released on Tuesday, August 17 shows an increase in the number of young scallops on Georges Bank, which could be a good sign for several years to come.

Standard-Times:  Reports of abundant young scallops bode well for New Bedford fishery
New Bedford’s scallop industry received a double-dose of good news, as two scientific studies found strong scallop stocks and high numbers of young shellfish on Georges Bank.

New England fishing leaders express deep concern over preliminary NMFS recommendations, which could represent "a cut of 67 percent from last year’s pollock catch".
If industry leaders are correct, the limits could imperil the Obama Administration’s highly-touted plans to move the industry to management by "Catch Shares".

According to the Monday story by Patrick Anderson "Sector fishery cooperatives, the linchpin of federal plans to protect wild fish stocks in New England, could collapse under new catch restrictions for one of the ocean’s more unpredictable species."
 
According to today’s editorial "Gloucester’s Vito Giacalone — who, as policy chief of the Northeast Seafood Coalition, has tried to work with government officials to ease the transition to the catch shares format — says the 67% figure will simply ‘break the system.’ Raymond Canastra, co-owner of the Whaling City Seafood Auction in New Bedford, says the NMFS’ pollock limits would be "the death knell" for many fishing boats."

The Times also noted that "a May review of existing research data and the findings of boat captains done by UMass-Dartmouth’s School of Marine Science and Technology found the science on which NMFS’ current regulatory Interim Rule is based to be ‘costly and misleading.’ That report, produced in conjunction with Gov. Deval Patrick’s office and the Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries, found NMFS’ assessment of winter flounder hopelessly flawed because the research apparently didn’t account for that fish’s swimming habits."

Read the story by Patrick Anderson.

Read the editorial.

Readers of Saving Seafood are likely aware of last week’s "back and forth" between the Gloucester Daily Times and the Northeast Seafood Coalition — some of which occurred on this site — on the catch share-related question of fishing sector fees.

At week’s end the Times wrote an editorial raising significant questions about the awkward situation created by the timing of regulatory requirements that should be understood by industry and reconsidered by regulators.

Anyone being asked to invest $10,000 in what amounts to a franchise should have some projection as to what they can expect in sales and revenues, and not have to trust a government agency that’s built distrust for years.

It’s understandable that fishermen out of Gloucester and around New England would be wary about Northeast Seafood Coalition’s effort to collect $10,000 as an investment in being part of a "sector" within the New England fishery’s new management system next year.

And that uncertainty has nothing to do with the coalition, which had taken a significant leadership role on the sector issue even before the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration stepped up its hard-line push under new chief administrator Jane Lubchenco.

It has everything to do with NOAA and its National Marine Fisheries Service, which is requiring the submission of potential rosters for these sectors — essentially little fishing corporations in which each boat will have a share of each group’s allowable catch — by Sept. 1 without having any idea of what that allowable catch may be.

Would you be willing to invest $10,000, or even $2,500 in a business franchise without knowing what the government-set sales limit will be? Of course not. Yet that’s what NMFS’s bullheaded time-frame is requiring, and how the Northeast Seafood Coalition is being forced to develop the business model its leaders have worked to build. One could argue the mere idea of government-set limits on "merchandise" is scary enough, especially when applied to ocean resources.

https://www.savingseafood.org/other-news/opinion-fishermen-need-to-know-catch-limits-before-buying-into-se-2.html

Northeast Seafood Coalition board member Vito Giacalone has responded to the Gloucester Times front page article “Fishing sector fee of 10k draws fire”.  The following is an excerpt from his response:

The Gloucester Times front page article “Fishing sector fee of 10k draws fire” by Richard Gaines (August 4th) contained incomplete or incorrect information that is sure to mislead. The record needs to be set straight immediately. 

The article begins by reporting that the Northeast Seafood Coalition (NSC) has put a $10,000 price on membership to the 13 cooperative corporations or “sectors” they are organizing……”  This statement is entirely misleading in that it incorrectly leads the reader to believe that the NSC is charging fishermen an admission fee, payable to the NSC for the benefit of the NSC.  Later in the article Gaines incorrectly placed an overall cost of $750,000 in the same sentence with my quote that the NSC should be “made whole”. The way Richard placed this into one sentence implies that the NSC is seeking to recoup $ 750,000 by charging 10k to fishermen to join a sector. This is also entirely inaccurate. 

As I intended to clearly explain to the GDT, being “made whole” means insuring that the organization (NSC) which has invested an enormous amount of time and money into the effort to provide the entire industry with a sector “OPTION” is not left with any debts, and that the membership’s hard-earned financial reserves that were expended should be replenished.  In case there remains any further confusion, here are all the facts…

Read the entire Northeast Seafood Coalition response at Saving Seafood.

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