April 16, 2013 — At the request of the New England Fishery Management Council, effective May 1, NOAA Fisheries will be implementing an emergency action suspending, for at least 180 days, existing monkfish possession limits for vessels issued a limited access multispecies permit and a limited access monkfish Category C or D permit that are fishing under a monkfish day-at-sea in the Northern Fishery Management Area. Monkfish are often landed while fishing for groundfish, particularly in this area.
In recent years, the monkfish fishery has failed to fully harvest the total allowable landings for each year, particularly in this management area. By providing increased fishing opportunities for monkfish in this area, we hope to help mitigate the severe quota reductions for some groundfish species in 2013, with little risk of overfishing monkfish.
These final measures differ slightly from what was initially proposed, which was to also allow the exemption if these vessels were fishing under a groundfish day. We adjusted the final measures in response to concerns raised by several fishermen and the Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council, which jointly manages monkfish with the New England Council that the proposed measures could shift effort into the Southern Fishery Management Area and cause unanticipated adverse impacts to the monkfish resource in this area and associated fishing communities.
Read the full release from NOAA