Saving Seafood

Millions pegged for salmon, steelhead recovery

September 25, 2023 — The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is recommending sending $106 million to 16 salmon and steelhead recovery efforts in five Western states.

NOAA and the Department of Commerce recommended grants to state agencies with salmon protection missions, tribes and tribal partnerships in Idaho, Alaska, Oregon, Washington and California.

The funding “provides an important opportunity to bolster salmon and steelhead recovery and invest in the communities that rely on them,” Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said in a statement.

Read the full article at The Challis Messenger

Lawsuit alleges iconic Pike Place Fish Market guilty of trademark infringement

September 12, 2023 — Pike Place Fish Market (PPFM), the iconic fresh seafood market inside Pike Place Market in Seattle, Washington, U.S.A., is facing a trademark infringement lawsuit.

The Pike Place Market Preservation and Development Authority (PDA), which manages the market, claims PPFM it is illicitly using its name to advertise products nationwide without PDA’s permission.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

The scales of justice: Salmon fisheries in federal court, fighting to keep their lines in the water

August 21, 2023 — More than 90% of wild salmon are caught in Alaskan waters, where the fish travel from the coasts of California, the Pacific Northwest, and British Columbia. As the total number of fish have declined, limits of a catch have naturally decreased. The Wild Fish Conservancy, based in Washington, sued over technicalities in the Endangered Species Act. The salmon have been deeply compromised by dams and pollution, says third-generation Alaskan and journalist Julia O’Malley. Because the fish swimming up from the Lower 48 may be potentially endangered, Alaskan fisheries must come up with a mitigation plan. A judge was compelled by the Conservancy’s complaint of how to enact such a plan. Alaskan fisheries recently won a last minute reprieve in a lawsuit that would have kept lines out of the water this fishing season.

A pod of 73 endangered orcas in the region near Puget Sound feed on Chinook, also known as king salmon — the largest of the species, and whose populations are at historic lows. The orcas are in turn under threat of starvation,  not only because the salmon are less abundant, but because they are considerably smaller, dropping from a typical size of 60-100 pounds down to 30 pounds. As a result, the whales need to catch more of them to get the same amount of protein. Noise pollution and industrial runoff further compound the problem, interfering with the echolocation orcas use to locate salmon.

Alaska has a 100-year-old fishing tradition, according to O’Malley. For better or worse, communities around the state operate on an extraction economy, whether it’s oil, timber, or fishing.

Read the full story at KCRW

Collaboration between pollock industry and Seattle sports franchises boosts seafood awareness

August 18, 2023 — At entertainment and sports venues across the United States, where fans often enjoy pizza, hot dogs, nachos, and other stadium cuisine staples, seafood is typically absent from arena menus.

A newly minted partnership is on a mission to change that, however, and has picked a seafood-loving city to launch its innovative campaign: Seattle, Washington.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

Science is a strategy

July 13, 2023 — A first-in-the-U.S. pilot research project to develop sustainable practices for farming sablefish has now progressed to the point that a full-color sales sheet can boast to wholesalers about the “pearly white flesh, large velvety flakes, and sweet, rich flavor” of this native deep-sea fish, long a traditional food of the indigenous people of the Pacific Northwest.

The sablefish comes from the experimental net pens at the Manchester Research Station on Puget Sound in Washington, the result of a research collaboration and partnership among NOAA Fisheries’ Northwest Fisheries Science Center, the Jamestown S’Klallam Tribe, and the University of Washington.  

While scientists have overcome many daunting challenges during the pilot project, social and political pushback against aquaculture cloud the future of exactly how and where commercial rollout will occur in the U.S. The precedent already exists in Canada at Golden Eagle Sablefish in British Columbia, which is producing sablefish in partnership with the Kyuquot-Checleseht First Nations.

Read the full article at Aquaculture North America

Southeast trollers remain hooked in web of Washington lawsuit that could halt summer season

June 1, 2023 — The king salmon troll fishery in Southeast Alaska remains tangled in a net of legal proceedings that threatens the livelihood of this summer’s season. The season is scheduled to begin July 1.

The U.S. District Court of Western Washington ruled May 3 the Southeast king salmon summer and winter troll fisheries have been operating in violation of the Endangered Species Act and National Environmental Policy Act by causing irreversible harm to an endangered population of orcas, called southern resident killer whales. The whales travel through Washington’s Puget Sound area due to lack of prey, specifically wild king salmon that are caught by the fishery.

The ruling was in response to a lawsuit originally filed in 2019 by a Seattle-based environmental group, Wild Fish Conservancy, and the decision only affects the king salmon troll fishery in Southeast Alaska.

Read the full article at Juneau Empire

U.S. Department of Commerce allocates $220 million in fishery disaster funding to AK and WA

May 19, 2023 — U.S. Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo announced the allocation of over $220 million in fishery disaster funding, appropriated by Congress in the 2022 and 2023 Disaster Relief Supplemental Appropriations Acts. The funding will address fishery disasters that occurred in multiple Alaska and Washington fisheries between 2019 and 2023.

“Fishery disasters have devastating effects on local communities and our blue economy,” said Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo. “This disaster funding provides much needed assistance to our fishing industry and we will work with the affected communities to begin the difficult work of helping them recover.”

Read the full article at KINY

House GOP plans offshore wind hearings in Washington

March 20, 2023 — Congressional Republicans say they will hold Capitol Hill hearings on the Biden administration’s offshore wind policy – and potentially call in federal ocean and energy planners as witnesses, along with wind power developers.

“It is time we examine the process,” said Rep. Jeff Van Drew, R-NJ, as he opened a first public hearing March 16 in Wildwood, N.J., centered on objections raised by critics of offshore wind projects, especially their allegation that 12 Mid-Atlantic whale strandings this winter are tied to survey work, and demands for a moratorium.

“A dozen have died and there’s no interest at all in finding out what’s going on,” said Van Drew, who has promised legislation to suspend all work on wind projects in federal waters.

He compared the strandings of humpback whales on New Jersey beaches, some of them victims of ship strikes, to the federal response for protecting the highly endangered right whale from fishing gear entanglements, which has led to gear restrictions on the New England lobster fleet.

Read the full article at the National Fisherman

WASHINGTON: NWAA Launches Grassroots Campaign Spotlighting Damage Done by DNR Commissioner Hilary Franz’s Political Decision to End Commercial Net Pen Fish Farming in Washington

March 16, 2023 — The following was released by the Northwest Aquaculture Alliance:

In a new campaign launched today, Washington fish farming workers, who have grown affordable, high-quality fish in Puget Sound for over 40 years, are speaking out for the first time to expose the pain they and their families have endured as the result of DNR Commissioner Hilary Franz’s unilateral and unscientific decision to ban fish farming in state waters.

“Franz’s blatantly political action last November not only forced fish farmers out of work, but also ended the availability of affordable, nutritious, sustainable, and locally farmed fish for Washington consumers,” said Jeanne McKnight, Executive Director of the Northwest Aquaculture Alliance (NWAA), the organization behind the campaign. In its new www.stophilaryfranz.com grass-roots advocacy campaign, NWAA appeals to Washington citizens, asking them to send a letter to state legislators requesting an examination of Franz’s actions. Click here to watch and share the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oLkxXMW3KtM

“This unscientific ban on commercial net pens shows that Hilary Franz is playing politics with your dinner plate—at the expense of hard-working, dedicated people who have made the production of nutritious seafood their life-long career,” McKnight said. “It’s outrageous that Franz ignored multiple peer-reviewed scientific studies proving the ecological safety of farming fish and completely disregarded a unanimous Supreme Court decision affirming the legality of farming native steelhead in our state waters. We are outraged that she completely ignored the multi-year comprehensive study, conducted right here in Puget Sound, that gave rise to the recent biological opinion from NOAA showing no significant adverse impacts on endangered species by fish farms operating in the state.

Hilary Franz needs to act like a true leader and explain to our farmers who lost their livelihoods, just what science she used to make this harmful decision. She refuses to do that,” McKnight said.

“As the video reveals, Washington fish farm workers first learned about the Franz decision from a news story. This is unconscionable. This is NOT the kind of transparent leadership we should expect from our elected public servants.” McKnight said. She added, “We applaud these dedicated farm workers for making a public appeal, and on their behalf, we are pleading with Governor Jay Inslee and the Washington state Legislature to take a closer look at the devastating consequences of the Franz decision by hearing directly from the farmers who lost their livelihoods with no warning. It is important to question whether this unilateral decision runs counter to the letter and spirit of Washington law.”

In 1985, the legislature passed SB 3067, the “Aquatic Farming Act,” which declares that “aquatic farming provides a consistent source of quality food, offers opportunities of new jobs, increased farm income stability, and improves balance of trade.” The Act also declares, “It is therefore the policy of this state to encourage the development and expansion of aquaculture within this state.” This legislation is still Washington law, although it was modified by the passage of HB 2957 in 2018, calling for the end of farming of non-native species in state waters, but legalizing the farming of native species in state waters. The farmers who lost their jobs because of Franz’s actions were successfully farming native steelhead.

NWAA believes the Franz decision to ban fish farming in commercial net pens represents egregious government over-reach on the part of a politically ambitious agency head, and in its campaign, NWAA urges the legislature to take back its definitive authority to establish state policy around this critically important issue.

Farmers across the state consider it shameful that Commissioner Franz, flanked at a celebratory press conference by well-known anti-aquaculture and anti-commercial fishing activists, would gloat over destroying an important food production sector and killing the jobs of Washington farmers just one week before Thanksgiving last Fall. It’s clear that Hilary Franz was trying to score political points with activist groups, but without the courtesy of first notifying the employees whose jobs she killed. She refused to meet with the employees who attended her press conference and had asked to speak with her. Instead, she sent a political fundraising appeal within hours, bragging about what she had just done. This is not the type of leadership we expect from Franz or other Washington elected officials, especially at a time when food prices are at an all-time high and good jobs are scarce in rural communities.

After the last farmed steelhead was harvested in Puget Sound last month, a USDA-funded study revealed the Seattle-Tacoma market has the highest per capita consumption of farmed steelhead of any other metropolitan region in the country. With local fish farmers banned from producing such in-demand fish, Commissioner Franz’s actions will lead to higher prices and less availability of fresh, local, sustainably farmed, affordable fish.