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Commercial Fisheries News
Volume 34 Number 3
November 2006
Georges Bank cod, yellowtail TACs in limbo
PEABODY, MA – Troubled that US fishermen might be getting the raw end of the deal, the New England Fishery Management Council did not accept the negotiated US/Canada 2007 total allowable catch (TAC) shares for eastern Georges Bank cod.
And, for entirely different and more scientific reasons, the council did not endorse the negotiated numbers for Georges Bank yellowtail flounder either.
Instead, the council voted at its Sept. 26-28 meeting here to send back both the cod and yellowtail TACs to the US/Canada Transboundary Management Guidance Committee (TMGC) for “further development.”
The TMGC, which is made up of fishermen and fishery managers from both the US and Canada, is charged with taking scientific advice from the US/Canada Transboundary Resource Assessment Committee (TRAC) and then divvying up quota shares for the three big Georges Bank transboundary stocks – cod, haddock, and yellowtail – based on each country’s historical catch record, distribution of each stock known from trawl surveys, and the science.
This year, the TRAC met June 13-16 in Woods Hole, MA, and the TMGC met Sept. 7-8 in Portland, ME.
Following the TMGC meeting, representatives from each country went back to their respective management bodies seeking endorsement and implementation of the negotiated quota shares.
Haddock all set
On the US end, US TMGC head George Lapointe of Maine put the committee’s recommendations before the New England council, which needed to adopt the numbers before forwarding the results to the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) for implementation.
The only species that went smoothly was haddock. According to Lapointe, the TMGC concluded that “the most appropriate combined US/Canada TAC for eastern Georges Bank haddock for the 2007 fishing year is 19,000 metric tons.”
Under the sharing formula, the US was entitled to 33% of that total, equaling 6,270 metric tons (mt), and Canada was entitled to 67% or 12,730 mt.
The New England council easily approved the recommendation. According to scientists, this level of catch should result in a “neutral risk” that the fishing mortality rate (F) in 2007 would exceed its reference point of 0.26. The US share of the TAC covers only eastern Georges Bank haddock, not the entire offshore haddock stock.
Georges cod
Next, Lapointe put forward the TMGC’s determinations for eastern Georges Bank cod – 1,900 mt total with 26% or 494 mt for the US and 74% or 1,406 mt for Canada.
However, several council members noticed a table in the TMGC’s written report indicating that Canada had exceeded its cod quota in 2005 by 200 mt, and the overage wasn’t deducted from Canada’s proposed 2007 TAC share.
“They didn’t have a system in place to account for it,” explained Lapointe, who added that the Canadians were working on a way to deal with future overages.
That didn’t pacify anyone on the council.
“Frankly, I’m not sympathetic,” said David Pierce of Massachusetts.
And Tom Hill, also of Massachusetts, added, “We’re not allowed to go over. We’d be required to deal with it. There ought to be some acknowledgement that they’ve caught some of our fish. I don’t think we can let it be unsaid.”
Hill noted that Canada’s 2005 overage amounted to 40% of the total US allocation for 2007.
Accountability
After being peppered with questions, George Darcy, NMFS’s assistant regional administrator for sustainable fisheries in the Northeast, said the US was obligated to stay on track with an appropriate 2007 TAC.
“We’re responsible under the law to manage our fisheries,” he said. “It doesn’t really make sense to overfish to get even.”
But David Borden, who was intensely involved in the development of the US/Canada Resource Sharing Understanding, emphasized that the agreement did indeed stipulate that each country needed to account for TAC overages. Borden now represents the Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries and Massachusetts Marine Fisheries Institute.
“The agreement is clear,” he said. “There’s no ambiguity. If an overage occurs, the overage comes off. There’s no authority for anyone to forgive overages. This deprives the US of quota the following year.”
Several audience members were equally disturbed.
“Two hundred metric tons we’re going to forgive?” said Rich Canastra of the Whaling City Seafood Display Auction. “If we let this go through, shame on us. Shame on us. How can we have an understanding when we don’t have apples to apples?”
In the end, the council voted to “remand” the 2007 eastern Georges Bank cod TAC to the TMGC with a request that the TMGC address the Canadian 200 mt 2005 overage.
Yellowtail
The yellowtail flounder discussion was equally difficult.
According to Lapointe, the TMGC concluded that the appropriate combined US/Canada TAC for yellowtail should be 1,500 mt. Under the share-setting formula, the US would be entitled to 72% or 1,080 mt and Canada would be entitled to 28% or 420 mt.
Although the 1,500 mt was higher than the TRAC’s scientific recommendation of 1,250 mt, the age 4+ biomass was still projected to increase by 43% under the higher allocation, said Lapointe, who argued strongly in favor of the larger allocation.
“1,500 is 19% of where we were four years ago,” he said. “If we go any lower, we would have significant impacts in all our fisheries. All of these numbers were agreed to by the Canadian and US sides.”
This year’s stock assessment for yellowtail once again was extremely complicated with the TRAC rejecting the “base case” model and accepting the “major change” model, which reflected the decline in yellowtail abundance observed during all three surveys monitored by the TRAC.
The choice of models has been fiercely debated for two years now, but Lapointe said, “We understood that the base case model was rejected and we didn’t use it either.”
That didn’t stop the TMGC from supporting the 1,500 mt TAC, which Lapointe said would not undermine stock rebuilding.
Opponents
NMFS’s George Darcy immediately opposed the higher number.
“We can’t support this,” he said. “There are several very low indicators in the fishery. I think we need to be at least risk neutral and heed the scientific advice.”
Tom Hill was of the same mindset.
“I don’t see how we can change the scientific advice without a sound rationale,” he said, “and uncertainty is never sound rationale.”
Recognizing that NMFS didn’t intend to implement the higher number on the US side, some council members worried US fishermen would be put at a disadvantage compared to their Canadian counterparts.
“If we do not go back and renegotiate and we push this recommendation on to the fisheries service, NMFS will reduce us and the Canadians will still accept their share. I’m sure they will,” said New Hampshire council member John Nelson.
“Then we get the short end of the stick. We’re the ones who are going to get reduced,” he said.
Pierce, too, expressed serious reservations about the lower number.
“None of us realize the consequences to all our Georges Bank fisheries by going to these numbers. This has huge ramifications for all fisheries,” he said. “Fishermen will strive to compensate for the loss of fisheries on Georges Bank.”
Cut won’t help US
Several council members expressed additional concern about yellowtail catch and discards in the Canadian scallop fishery.
“They believe their bycatch in the scallop fishery has the chance to eat up all that quota,” said council Chairman and TMGC member John Pappalardo of Massachusetts.
Furthermore, many US fishermen feared the Canadian scallop bycatch might not be adequately accounted for.
“If we cut this down to 1,250 mt, there will be no practical reduction in the Canadian fishery,” said Vito Giacalone of the Northeast Seafood Coalition. “It’ll be the US alone again. We’ll be rebuilding continuously. In practice, we have a transboundary stock here that’s going to be fished more heavily by the Canadians.”
Maggie Raymond of Associated Fisheries of Maine said, “It’s clear that there’s no benefit to the US scallop fleet or the US groundfish fleet to go to 1,250 mt, but more importantly, it’s no benefit to the resource. The Canadians will take the TAC in the scallop fishery.”
Rich Canastra thought a major point was being lost in the debate.
“The economic impact is going to be significant at 1,250 or 1,500,” he said.
“It’s ironic that just three years ago we had that SAP,” he said, referring to the Yellowtail Flounder Special Access Program in the southern half of Closed Area II.
“We started out at 7,900 mt for yellowtail, then went to 6,000, then 3,000, then 1,250. Every year we’re going in half,” Canastra said.
“Be conservative”
John Williamson of The Ocean Conservancy urged the council to be conservative and renegotiate toward 1,250 mt.
“At this point, this body of managers is blameless for this problem,” he said. “If you take this action, you are blameless again. You are attempting to do the right thing. If this turns into a tragedy in the next year or two, it’ll be the Canadians’ fault if they don’t address it on the Canadian side of the line.”
Given NMFS’s seemingly unswayable position, the council determined it had no choice but to remand the yellowtail TAC to the TMGC. The council directed its TMGC members to negotiate a quota that was consistent with the fishing mortality reference point cited by TRAC scientists. The TRAC’s “neutral risk” reference point was 0.25.
At press time, US and Canadian TMGC representatives were arranging another meeting.
In an Oct. 2 letter to NMFS Northeast Regional Administrator Pat Kurkul, Pappalardo wrote, “The council would like to review new recommendations for these TACs at the November council meeting, if possible, but we recognize that it may be difficult for the TMGC to meet this schedule.”
US/Canada sharing; 2007 Georges Bank TACs at a glance
Here are the total allowable catch (TAC) shares recommended by the US/Canada Transboundary Management Guidance Committee (TMGC) for 2007, as well as the New England Fishery Management Council's response to each.
• Eastern Georges Bank haddock – Total TAC of 19,000 metric tons (mt) with 33% or 6,270 mt for the US and 67% or 12,730 mt for Canada. The New England council accepted this recommendation and passed it on to the National Marine Fisheries Service for implementation.
• Eastern Georges Bank cod – Total TAC of 1,900 mt with 26% or 494 mt for the US and 74% or 1,406 mt for Canada. The New England council rejected this recommendation and remanded it to the TMGC, asking the committee to address a 200-mt overage in Canada’s 2005 cod catch.
• Georges Bank yellowtail flounder – Total TAC of 1,500 mt with 72% or 1,080 mt for the US and 28% or 420 mt for Canada. The New England council rejected this recommendation and remanded it to the TMGC, asking the committee to “negotiate a quota that is consistent” with the scientific advice for the fishing mortality reference points. Scientists initially recommended a total TAC of 1,250 mt.
Janice M. Plante
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