Quote:
Originally Posted by BasicPatrick
My point is that the response to this assessment should be about bringing some more fairness/balance in the allocation of the overall harvest. The reduction industry has already telegraphed it wants to roll back catch limits for its own sector. Do you think 80% of the sustainable harvest should be allocated to one company for one purpose while only 20% is allocated to the rest of the nation aka the bait sector and recreational harvest?
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In theory I would agree with you, but as a practical matter all of the northeastern states have given the bait/recreational sector free rein to catch as much as they can. None of the northeastern states have curtailed their catch, all of them have treated the entire bait/recreational sector as "bycatch" to avoid having to restrict the catch.
So I might turn the question around to; "is it fair than only one sector of the fishery has been restricted while the other sectors have been been given free rein to catch whatever they can"?
Personally I would much prefer an open discussion as to what is the "proper" distribution of the catch, rather than the subterfuges used in the past. Hopefully, this stock assessment, which shows that the sky really isn't falling will give us the latitude to have that discussion.
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