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Commercial Fisheries News
Volume 33 Number 7
March 2006
NE council changes herring incidental permit criteria
PORTLAND, ME - At the urging of the Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council, the New England council made a significant revision to the limited-access incidental catch permit criteria in Amendment 1 to the federal herring plan during its Jan. 31-Feb. 2 here.
Back in November, the New England council significantly altered the permit qualifying criteria compared to what had gone out to public hearing as a preferred alternative.
Instead of selecting the original proposal of Jan. 1, 1988-Sept. 16, 1999 as qualifying years for a limited-access permit in Area 1 and Jan. 1, 1988-Dec. 31, 2003 for a limited-access permit in Areas 2 and 3, the council adopted Jan. 1, 1993-Dec. 31, 2003 for both permits.
The council adopted those same dates for limited-access incidental catch permits, though it increased the possession limit for vessels holding this permit from 15 metric tons (mt) to 25 mt.
The move seriously troubled the Mid-Atlantic council because the 1993-2003 dates would have prevented several mackerel boats with a history of herring catches from obtaining limited-access permits.
The Mid-Atlantic council is responsible for mackerel management.
Regulatory discards
At its Jan. 17-19 meeting in Annapolis, MD, the Mid-Atlantic council voted to ask the New England council to reconsider its November decision.
In a Jan. 24 letter to New England council Chairman Frank Blount, Mid-Atlantic council Chairman Ronal Smith asked the council to adopt Jan. 1, 1988-Dec. 31, 2003 as the limited-access qualifying years.
“Inclusion of these years is important in capturing the activity of the directed mackerel fishery during years when significant mixing of herring and mackerel occurred and favorable market conditions allowed for the retention of herring taken incidentally in this fishery,” said Smith.
Without corrective action, mackerel vessels that catch herring “would likely experience increased regulatory discards or compliance problems with the proposed open-access incidental possession limit for herring (3 mt), thereby impeding their ability to participate in the directed mackerel fishery,” Smith said.
He concluded, “No social or economic reason has been demonstrated as to why these mackerel vessels should be excluded from the herring fishery in Areas 2 and 3 where no capacity problem appears to exist.”
Support for Mid-Atlantic
Several New England vessel owners and association leaders stood up to support their fellow Mid-Atlantic counterparts.
Peter Moore of the American Pelagic Association (APA) said, “Our point here is: we don’t see the capacity that everyone seems to indicate is there for the offshore harvesting areas. It’s a market driven fishery and it will always be a market limited fishery.”
According to Moore, APA “remains committed” to a controlled-access program for Areas 2 and 3 that includes all historic and current participants “through 2005 at a minimum.”
Vito Calomo, executive director of the Massachusetts Fisheries Recovery Commission, also supported this course of action.
Pointing to enormous investments made in processing and offloading facilities in Gloucester, New Bedford, and Fall River, Calomo said, “People who have invested in the Americanization of this fishery deserve a place in it in the future. You need to allow the people who are in the fishery today to stay in it.”
He concluded, “Please reconsider the way this amendment is heading.”
Greg DiDomenico, executive director of the Garden State Seafood Association, urged the New England council to adopt the 1988-2003 dates. A change would avoid the “direct and severe negative impacts” to New Jersey’s commercial fishing fleet imposed by the 1993-2003 period, he said.
Kurkul opposed
Pat Kurkul told the council she was opposed to the qualifying criteria change.
“I don’t see the rational for authorizing boats to get into the fishery that haven’t been there for 14 years,” she said of going back to 1988.
“I keep hearing the TAC hasn’t been taken (in Areas 2 and 3), but that has nothing to do with the capacity we have in the fleet,” she said.
New Hampshire council member John Nelson agreed with the capacity point and added, “I think we have a large enough area that’s been open.”
Mid-Atlantic council representative Dennis Spitsbergen of North Carolina strongly disagreed.
“You don’t have a capacity issue in Areas 2 and 3,” he said.
However, sensing the council’s reluctance to add more boats to the limited-access fishery, Spitsbergen asked the council to at least consider altering the incidental catch permit.
“Otherwise, these boats will still mackerel fish and then have to discard herring or not be in compliance,” he said.
Rhode Island council member Phil Ruhle questioned the council’s approach to the whole issue.
By lopping off 1988-1992, he said, “You’re throwing out boats that can take 100,000 pounds.” But by extending the qualifying years to 2003, “you’re letting in boats that carry a million pounds,” he said.
Although he and several other council members had supported upping the possession limit for incidental catch permits from 15 mt to 25 mt back in November as a way to remedy the mackerel/herring interaction problem, Ruhle said, “After talking with industry, we realized that wasn’t the fix. It was a very small Band-Aid.”
Final decision
In the end, the council voted to change the qualifying years for limited-access incidental catch permits to 1988 through 2003 but to leave the full-scale limited-access permits for Area 1 and for Areas 2 and 3 at 1993-2003.
While “not totally happy,” Spitsbergen said, “I thank you very much for the consideration you gave the Mid-Atlantic council.”
Janice M. Plante
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