It’s a sea change for those who make a living from the sea.
After 15 years of fishing under a restrictive tangle of regulations designed to limit time, energy, fishermen and fish caught, commercial fishermen now can opt out and join co-ops (called sectors) like those pioneered right off our own shore by the Cape Cod Commercial Hook Fishermen’s Association.
“It’s the most important decision for the future of the business,” Eric Brazer, policy analyst with the Cape Cod Commercial Hook Fishermen’s Association, declared from Portland, Maine, where he was attending the New England Fisheries Management Council meeting. The option to join a sector, he added, is key to the “livelihood of every groundfisherman on Cape Cod.”