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Herring Pair Trawls & Observer fundings
Very interesting column in Regulation Watch by Catherine Cramer in OTW this month. She goes over the Marine Fishieries observers (or the lack of) on commercial fishing boats and how some areas have none, like the midwater trawl and pair trawl herring boats. She writes: "According to New England Fisheries Management Council staff, only .003 percent of domestic Atlantic herring trips have been observed since 1996." She also writes "Landings of Atlantic herring have increased dramatically, in some areas representing a 500 percent increase in just two years..." This does not bode well for these forage fish.
She also brings up bycatch with some very gloomy news: "Over one million, and perhaps as much as two million, pounds of striped bass were caught and discarded in the Northeast trawl fishery between May 2002 and April 2003, according to Oceana, a Washington-based nonprofit group...". This can't be good. At minimum, if these numbers are close to accurate, that is the equivalent of the entire Mass R&R commercial allocation being discarded as bycatch.
The good news? There is some. She mentions that Congress has doubled the funding for observers on these boats and the greatest increases will be for observers in the Northeast groundfish which were not previously funded, including $450K or so for the the herring trawls...
If you have OTW, please read the column, if you don't have OTW, buy or borrow one for this... Pretty stinkin' important read if you ask me.
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