Facing a 2011 deadline to end overfishing in U.S. waters, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has been working to expand the use of a management system designed to end the race for fish that has resulted in dozens of ocean species in trouble.
On Thursday, a task force handed the agency a set of recommendations to build support among fishermen and break through the bureaucracy that has held up wider adoption of catch shares. The system gives individual shares of the catch to fishermen, cooperatives or even communities, as well as responsibility not to overfish protected stocks. Each permit holder has a specific quota of fish they can catch, ending the race to gather as many fish as possible.
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration chief Jane Lubchenco has pushed the system as part of a comprehensive national ocean policy endorsed by President Barack Obama. But it can take years for regional fishery management councils that set commercial fishing seasons to work through the process.
The Environmental Defense Fund praised the recommendations, saying that catch shares have restored fish populations while improving the livelihoods of fishermen.