A global firm with close ties to top federal fisheries officials and the Environmental Defense Fund, architect of the nation's catch share policy, is one of four that has been qualified to provide on-board monitoring — worth as much as $6.5 million a year — when the New England fisheries go under catch system rules May 1.
UPDATE: Firm announced winning contract before it was awarded. See Environmental firm jumped gun on deal with NOAA
Marion Veber, the acquisitions officer in charge of the selection, which is expected this week, declined all comment on the matter yesterday and refused to identify the qualified firms competing for all or a part of the monitoring contract for the catch share system.
But MRAG Americas, whose president Andrew Rosenberg cuts a high profile in global fisheries, has posted on its Web site that it has already been selected.
[read the full story in the Gloucester Daily Times]