Arch enemies on most ocean issues, the Environmental Defense Fund and the Recreational Fishing Alliance both expressed reservations Thursday about the whether a dire assessment of Gulf of Maine cod, the essential food fish for commercial and charter boats, can reliably be used to drive regulatory policy.
The peer-reviewed assessment, which leaked out with a jaw-dropping thud last fall, was put through a public debate and evaluation Wednesday in Providence, R.I., at a meeting of the Science and Statistical Committee of the New England Fishery Management Council.
The committee took a nearly unprecedented step of not ratifying the assessment, a move that legally keeps open several options for the regional council, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and Secretary of Commerce John Bryson.
Bryson and NOAA flagged the problem before the study was peer-reviewed, and has organized working groups to grapple with the legal and political implications of the assessment.
Read the complete opinion piece from The Gloucester Times