Regional fishery management councils around the country are now facing a 14 percent reduction in their funding and a number of other research programs will be suspended as details of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's budget proposal for fiscal year 2013 emerged thiss week.
With the agency under pressure from the administration to reduce spending, the National Marine Fisheries Service budget will be scaled back to the 2009 level of around $880 million. NOAA has been directed by the administration to identify cost savings this year and to improve its overall efficiency.
"We want to ensure we support fishing in a sustainable manner, but there are some cuts," said Sam Rauch, head of the NOAA's fisheries service, in a conference call with stakeholders Friday afternoon. Rauch warned that most of the NMFS funding was in the "discretionary spending" category. "Every one of our services is valuable to us and we had to make some hard choices," he said.
There was some good news in the proposal for fishermen in the Northeast, where NOAA is seeking additional money for fisheries research, stock assessments and to fund its onboard observer program.
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