Saving Seafood

U.S. fleet gets long-term deal in tuna-rich Pacific

June 29, 2016 โ€” American fishing companies will have access to some of the most tuna-rich waters in the world until 2023.

Negotiators from the U.S., island nations and American fishing companies agreed to a new South Pacific Tuna Treaty on Saturday in New Zealand that reduces the number of days that U.S. boats can fish but also gives them the option of buying as many fishing days as they need, instead of a set amount per the previous agreement.

The U.S. State Department announced in January it would pull out of a treaty for a vast area of the Pacific Ocean โ€” source of 60 percent of the nationโ€™s canned tuna โ€” after some American boats said they could not pay fees owed to a cluster of Pacific island nations.

โ€œ(The new treaty) gave us pretty much what we hoped for,โ€ said J. Douglas Hines of the Global Companies, a group of three Nevada-based firms with offices in San Diego. โ€œThis is behind us for now.โ€

Although negotiations are officially over, the deal still needs final approval from the nationsโ€™ governments. Most people involved in the negotiations do not predict any issues because representatives have already signed off.

Read the full story at Bloomberg

Plan to Establish Aquaculture in Offshore Waters Challenged by U.S. Conservation/Environmental Groups

New Orleans, LA โ€” February 17, 2016 โ€” Center for Food Safety has filed a new lawsuit challenging the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administrationโ€™s (NOAA) new federal regulations permitting, for the first time, industrial aquaculture offshore in U.S. federal waters in the Gulf of Mexico. The plaintiff coalition CFS is representing in the case make up a broad array of significant interests in the Gulf of Mexico, including commercial, economic, recreational, and conservation purposes: the Gulf Fishermenโ€™s Association; Gulf of Mexico Reef Fish Shareholdersโ€™ Alliance; Charter Fishermenโ€™s Association; Destin Charter Boat Association; Clearwater Marine Association; Alabama Charter Fishing Association; Fish for America, USA, Inc.; Florida Wildlife Federation; Gulf Restoration Network; Recirculating Farms Coalition; and Food & Water Watch.

โ€œOffshore industrial aquaculture will cause irreparable harm to the Gulf ecosystems and coastal communities,โ€ said George Kimbrell, senior attorney for CFS and counsel for the plaintiffs. โ€œWe need to better manage and protect our native fisheries, not adopt destructive industrial food practices that put them at risk. This lawsuit, brought by a range of concerned stakeholders, aims to halt these shortsighted plans.โ€

โ€œOur intention in being a part of this lawsuit is to not only help protect our members and commercial fishermen but to also help protect the fishing and non fishing public who depend on the wild fish stocks from damage that may occur from a numerous amount of various dangers from farm raising fish in open ocean pens in the Gulf of Mexico,โ€ said Glen Brooks of the Gulf Fishermenโ€™s Association.

The questionable federal permitting scheme, more than ten years in the making, is NOAAโ€™s attempt to do an end-run around the United States Congress: multiple national bills that would have allowed and regulated industrial aquaculture never made it into law in the past decade. In an effort to push offshore aquaculture forward without a new law permitting it, NOAA exceeded its authority to regulate fishing under the Magnuson-Stevens Act and now plans to permit offshore aquaculture as a โ€œfishingโ€ activity.

Read the full story from The Fishing Wire