An advertisement stating "Catch Shares Work" ran in the Washington, DC political newspaper "Politico" on March 1st signed by 14 fisheries organizations.
The ad stated that it was paid for by the Gulf of Mexico Reef Fish Shareholders Alliance.
See the ad from Politico here.
Suffolk County Long Island County Executive Steve Levy has written to NMFS Northeast Regional Administrator Patricia Kurkul expressing concern that "implementing a catch shares management program will likely result in further shrinkage of the Suffolk's fishing industry."
For more than five years, stock assessments for monkfish have shown to be on the positive side of the species rebuilding schedule.
To date, Suffolk's monkfish fishery has been subject to, and has followed, the Days at Sea (DAS) management system with much success in terms of catch and fishery sustainability. For more than five years, stock assessments for monkfish have shown to be on the positive side of the species rebuilding schedule.
As a result, the monkfish industry has great concern over the proposed implementation of a catch shares program as a fishery management tool for monkfish. There is the fear this will result in a rapid consolidation of the commercial fishing fleet, resulting in fewer fishermen and a loss of the economic multipliers associated with the maintenance of a healthy fishing fleet.
Every regulation that has been implemented at the state and federal levels of government on the fishing industry is another burden that a weakening industry has to carry. Suffolk's commercial fishing industries are fighting for survival and cannot afford to have any facet adapt to a new management plan, especially when the current plan is working.
Implementing a catch shares management program will likely result in further shrinkage of the Suffolk's fishing industry. This industry already follows the current regulations related to catch limits and bears the cost of updating equipment, all while battling ever increasing fuel prices and diminishing returns.
The fishing industry in Suffolk is not only a mainstay of the local economy, it is an important part of its heritage. I strongly urge that the DAS management program be maintained for the monkfish fishery in Southern New England waters.
Read the letter from Steve Levy to Patricia Kirkul.
Each week on WBSM in New Bedford, Massachusetts, Bob Vanasse of Saving Seafood joins host Phil Paleologos to discuss issues related to the fisheries with news-making guests.
Congressman Walter Jones (R-NC) discusses his recent legislative success with the Jones Amendment — a measure to strip funding for the implementation of new catch share programs by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). The measure passed the House of Representatives by a wide margin of 259 to 159.
[click here and listen now]
Florida commercial fishermen joined a push in Washington, D.C., this week to slow a federal push toward mandating catch-share programs for many food fisheries.
"Catch shares were supposed to be a bottom-up thing with fishermen working to submit management plans," Kelly said. "Instead, NOAA is trying to force this down our throats."
Fishermen say that in fisheries that have instituted catch shares, the result has been a consolidation of the industry, favoring the corporate fishing fleets at the expense of individual fishing families.
Some conservation groups, notably the Environmental Defense Fund, contend that catch shares will be far more effective than current regulations in protecting fish populations from becoming overfished.
At a Feb. 3 federal workshop in Key Largo, dozens of fishermen spoke out against catch shares. Connecticut commercial fisherman Joe Gilbert interrupted his Keys vacation to attend the session, pointing to his experience in New England.
"What's happened is disgraceful," Gilbert said. "Catch shares are promoted by the winners … jobs have been lost to consolidation, and the right to fish is down to a very few."
Read the complete story from Keys Net.
For the past 10 years, the New England Fisheries Management Council has been well served by a long-time Cape fisherman. John Pappalardo, CEO of the Cape Cod Commercial Hook Fisherman's Association, has served on the multi-state board with distinction.
Because of term limits, however, Pappalardo must step down this spring.
Fortunately, Tom Dempsey, policy director for the hook fisherman's association, has been nominated to replace Pappalardo. He has earned the support of the entire Cape and Islands legislative delegation as well as many fishing organizations, both commercial and recreational.
If Dempsey is not selected to replace Pappalardo, the Cape's population of commercial fishermen, which derive their living from the sea, will be disenfranchised from the decision-making process that most affects their lives.
Currently, no other council member that represents commercial fishing interests is based on the Cape, which has a unique small day-boat fishery. The fishery requires a different set of considerations from the larger off-shore fleets based in Gloucester and New Bedford.
Read the complete story from The Cape Cod Times.
James Caito, Vice President of Caito Fisheries, writes to Congressman Mike Thompson to explain how Caito Fisheries has purchased "zero pounds of trawl groundfish" this year, a situation which he attributes to the implementation of a Catch Shares system in California.
Caito Fisheries is a seafood processor with processing plants and seafood buying stations in Fort Bragg, San Francisco, and Eureka, California. Caito is one of the few processors remaining in California that handles trawl groundfish. The Caito family has been involved in fisheries since arriving in the United States as immigrants many generations ago.
Read the letter from Mr. Caito to Congressman Thompson.
Editor's Note: Winter flounder is not the same species as Yellowtail flounder, the allocation levels on which were also recently increased. Yellowtail allocation was increased as a result of a legislative correction related to the U.S.-Canada transboundary agreement championed by Congressman Barney Frank (D-Mass.) and Senator Olympia Snowe (R-Maine). It does not face the issues described in this article.
NEW BEDFORD, Mass. – It sounds like good news for fishermen. Catch limits for Southern New England winter flounder have been raised by 40 percent for the next fishing year, which begins May 1, federal regulators have announced.
However, under the existing regulations they cannot legally possess or land this fish.
With the limit up to 1.6 million pounds from 1.1 million, the increase means that a further 500,000 pounds of winter flounder, a vulnerable stock, can be discarded. Dead.
"For the National Marine Fisheries Service to put this forward as an example of flexibility is really a slap in the face," said Steve Cadrin, a professor at the School for Marine Science and Technology at UMass Dartmouth, and chairman of the New England Fishery Management Council's science and statistical committee."What this allows is more discard of winter flounder … Fishermen don't benefit a bit from that increase because it's still a no-possession fishery. It's 40 percent more fish being discarded overboard."
Cadrin said that the science and statistical committee was explicit in advocating that it not be discarded. But there is no consensus for allowing fishermen to harvest even a portion of the increase.
Bringing some in is not a solution, according to Tom Nies, a senior analyst with the New England Fishery Management Council. "The council put forward the zero catch limit because we don't want people targeting it," he said. "Also, we don't really know if fishermen are actually throwing 1.1 million pounds over now."
Low catch limits on weaker stocks, known as choke species, prevent fishermen from harvesting their full quota on others that are more abundant. The total allowable catch for the New England groundfishery this year is approximately 140,000 tons, but only around 40,000 tons of that will be landed because of such constraints, according to Brian Rothschild, former dean of SMAST and the Montgomery Charter Professor of Marine Sciences and Technology at UMass Dartmouth. "They talk about helping fishermen but we're leaving millions of dollars worth of fish in the water," he said.
Read the complete story from The South Coast Today.
NOAA today proposed new measures for the 2011 groundfishing year that give fishermen greater opportunity to fish in Northeast waters, assist small vessel owners, and continue important stock rebuilding.
The rule, called Framework 45, is based on recommendations by the New England Fishery Management Council and is open for comment March 3.
"As we prepare to enter a new fishing year, NOAA is working with the council and the fishing industry to increase fishing on healthy stocks and address economic challenges faced by fishing communities," said Eric Schwaab, assistant NOAA administrator for NOAA's Fisheries Service. "At the same time, we are continuing programs to rebuild groundfish stocks for the long-term benefits they provide."
Two key measures being proposed include extending the rebuilding period for Georges Bank yellowtail flounder, by two years to 2016, and a 2.5 million pound yellowtail flounder catch limit increase for U.S. fishermen. The increase, which was recommended by U.S. and Canadian fishery managers earlier this month, would represent a 44 percent increase over what was initially agreed to for this jointly managed stock for the 2011 fishing year, and an 18 percent increase over 2010 levels.
Catch limits for 2011 were set last year for 20 groundfish stocks. The measures announced today propose changes to limits for five stocks. If all the changes are approved, catch limits will increase over the 2010 limits for 12 stocks, decrease for 3 stocks and stay the same for the remaining 5. Some of the largest increases would be for Southern New England/Mid-Atlantic yellowtail flounder, witch flounder and Southern New England winter flounder.
Another measure in Framework 45 will help small boat fishermen who practice a traditional form of fishing using a hand-held line to catch small amounts of groundfish. These fishermen would be allowed to fish in areas closer to shore when they are seasonally closed to most other groundfishing vessels. This would help these fishermen whose smaller vessels cannot move into waters farther from shore to catch groundfish.
Scallop fishermen would also benefit from a proposed measure that would lift a ban on some scallop vessels operating in part of the Great South Channel on Georges Bank during the spring. The ban was originally intended to protect spawning yellowtail flounder. This protection is now provided by strong limits on how much yellowtail flounder can be caught by sea scallop vessels.
To assist with the transition to sector fisheries management in the area, the measures proposed today include a council recommended temporary delay in the shifting of the costs of catch monitoring, which is currently paid by NOAA, to fishing vessels. Under the proposal, industry would have two more years to prepare for covering these costs, beginning in 2013.
Another provision would close an area in the southern Gulf of Maine off to groundfishing in April and June to protect spawning cod. Commercial and recreational fishermen, the Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries and scientists from the University of New Hampshire recommended the closure to boost the recovery of the Gulf of Maine cod stock.
Comments must be received by March 18, 2011. Electronic public comments can be submitted via the Federal eRulemaking Portal: http://www.regulations.gov.; or faxed to (978) 281-9135, Attn: Douglas Christel or submitted by mail to Patricia A. Kurkul, Regional Administrator, National Marine Fisheries Service, 55 Great Republic Drive, Gloucester, MA 01930. Mark the outside of the envelope, "Comments on the Proposed Rule for NE Multispecies Framework Adjustment 45."
ST. PETERSBURG – Fishermen/fisherwomen came from all over the eastern U.S. to protest the National Marine Fisheries Service about current fishing regulations they deem as over-regulations. The peaceful gathering was held outside the NMFS headquarters where many guest speakers promoted conservation, but expressed bylaw concerns to a cheering crowd. Organizers plan to take their message to Washington D.C. in the next few days.
Many anglers felt that some of the data used to implement government regulations on fishing populations is incorrect or out dated. For instance, the NFHS issued a moratorium on red snapper in federal waters from the east coast of North Carolina to Florida. While NFHS feels the closure will give the fish a “needed break”, anglers argue that in the instance of red snapper, not only have regulations since 1991 prevented the species from being overfished, but they have allowed the fish to thrive in recent years.
One organization, the East Coast Fishing Section, a segment of the Southeastern Fisheries Association, claimed they challenged an NMFS study that found that red snapper were overfished to the point of near extinction.
Read the complete story from The Bradenton Times.
The pro-catch share petition circulated anonymously in the intensifying congressional debate over the Obama administration's plan to commodify wild fish stocks was written by Maggie Raymond, an industry executive with the region's largest "sector" or fishing cooperative, according to a document obtained Friday by the Times.
The Sustainable Harvest sector has unmatched links to the rule-making council and is also the biggest player in the new groundfish-stocks market.
In an e-mail to members of the sector, Raymond said she drafted the petition at the request of Mike Leary, a Sustainable Harvest member and an appointee to the New England Fishery Management Council, which wrote the rules for the transformation of the $60 million groundfishery into a commodities market, with fishermen working off an allotted catch but encouraged to buy, sell or trade their "catch shares" among themselves or to outside investment interests.
"Mike Leary asked me to put together the attached letter," Raymond wrote on Monday. "He is going to try to get a bunch of signatures. Can you get your people you know (owners/crews) to sign? How long would that take?"
Raymond and Leary did not return calls or respond to e-mail queries regarding to decision not to assert authoriship.
Outside the Sustainable Harvest sector, most fishermen who received the anonymous petition and were interviewed by the Times said they had no intention of signing it, based on the catch share system's record of steering control of America's fisheries into fewer and larger corporate hands, while driving out smaller, independent boats.
Read the complete story from the Gloucester Daily Times.