GLOUCESTER, MA (February 17, 2009) – Even as battles in and out of federal court rage over the controls system long used by the federal government to regulate the North Atlantic fishery, a different future is taking form for the core of the industry that survives.
Perhaps as soon as May 2010, the current business model — based on National Marine Fisheries commitment to regulate every move of each entrepreneurial individual with a federal groundfish permit and a boat — will be junked.
In its place, the vast majority of boat-owning permit holders — after coalescing voluntarily into 19 business cooperatives known as "sectors" — will fish under mandates that are largely of their own making. The new mandates will feature a hard quota or "total allowable catch," rather than the current, effort-based regulations that limit fishermen’s days at sea and their access to specific fishing grounds.
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