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Commercial Fisheries News
Volume 33 Number 12
August 2006
Georges Bank yellowtail SAP: Zero trips for 2006
Study explains 2004 SAP fiasco: Derby fishing, flooded market, low prices
GLOUCESTER, MA – For the second year in a row, the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) has authorized zero trips for the Closed Area II Yellowtail Flounder Special Access Program (SAP) on Georges Bank (GB).
NMFS Northeast Regional Administrator Pat Kurkul made the 2006 fishery decision based on results from a predetermined formula outlined in Framework Adjustment 40B to the groundfish plan and consultations with the New England Fishery Management Council.
Under Framework 40B, the regional administrator must first take into account the total allowable catch (TAC) for Georges Bank yellowtail flounder established through the US/Canada Resource Sharing Understanding.
Using the US TAC share as the baseline, the regional administrator then must consider:
• Amount of yellowtail expected to be caught outside the SAP;
• Recent discard estimates; and
• Expected number of SAP participants.
If the remaining tonnage isn’t enough to support at least 150 trips with a 15,000-pound possession limit, the regional administrator can choose to authorize zero SAP trips. In short, at least 1,020 metric tons (mt) of yellowtail need to be available for the SAP under these criteria.
The 2006 US TAC for Georges Bank yellowtail is 2,070 mt. NMFS calculated that just 124 mt would be available for the SAP, enough for only 27 trips.
In a May 22 Federal Register notice, NMFS said, “It would not be feasible or equitable to allocate and monitor such a low number of trips across the fleet. (This) … would likely cause a derby fishery, which would be impossible to monitor and control in such a way to ensure that the low available catch is not exceeded.”
NMFS allocated zero trips for the 2005 fishery as well.
2004 SAP
The only time the Closed Area II yellowtail SAP was actually opened was in 2004, the first year of its existence. It began on June 1 that year and was limited to a total of 320 trips with no more than two trips authorized per vessel per month under a 30,000-pound possession limit. The program allowed fishermen to use B-days and was scheduled to run through Dec. 31.
The fishery went gangbusters right from the start. During the first three weeks of the program, the Whaling City Seafood Display Auction in New Bedford sold 250,000 pounds, 461,000 pounds, and 400,000 pounds of yellowtail respectively.
NMFS shut down the SAP on Sept. 3 after projecting that most of the trips had been taken. A final 2004 summary on NMFS’s web site indicates that, all told, 326 SAP trips were taken – 58 on B-regular days, 267 on B-reserve days, and one on A-days.
Study provides overview
A new report titled “In Hindsight: Yellowtail Flounder 2004” sums up the experience. Authored by Madeleine Hall-Arber of MIT Sea Grant, this “case study” was part of the Massachusetts Fishermen’s Partnership’s (MFP) Community Panels Project, which was funded by the Northeast Consortium and the Saltonstall-Kennedy Grant Program. Principal investigators included Hall-Arber, MFP’s David Bergeron, and Rutgers University’s Bonnie McCay.
According to Hall-Arber, the community panels project served as a vehicle for updating socio-economic information from several fishing communities: Beals Island and Portland, ME; Gloucester, the Massachusetts South Shore, and New Bedford, MA; and Point Judith, RI.
“People wanted to talk about what was important to them,” said Hall-Arber.
And at the time, all anyone in New Bedford wanted to talk about was the yellowtail SAP. In turn, the community panel work evolved into a case study of the SAP itself. Fishermen interviewed for the project – primarily from New Bedford but elsewhere as well – viewed the yellowtail access program as a complete fiasco.
What happened
According to the panel’s final report, the SAP turned into an instant derby. The market was flooded with yellowtail. Prices on the Whaling City auction plummeted to as low as 20 cents for larges and 10 cents for smalls during the third week of June. Processors couldn’t handle the volume. Quality – not always the best in June anyway because of spawning conditions – was “exacerbated” by the situation. And prices for other flounder species dropped as well.
The obvious question was: Why didn’t boats just stop fishing?
“People kept going because they were scared not to,” said Hall-Arber. “They kept repeating that. They said, ‘We felt we had to go. We felt we had to create a history.’”
The B-day program was new at the time, and it quickly became clear in the community panel study that fishermen were genuinely worried they wouldn’t be allocated B-days in the future if they didn’t use the ones they had at the moment. No one could convince them otherwise.
The report states, “When days-at-sea were designed, allocations were directly based on fishing history. Consequently, the fishermen assumed that B-day use could also serve as precedent for future allocations, regardless of any statement to the contrary by managers or even the regulations themselves.”
Lessons learned
Once yellowtail landings from the SAP spiraled out of control in 2004, many fishermen called for lower trip limits, arguing that 30,000 pounds per trip was just too much.
However, for a number of reasons detailed in the report, the limit wasn’t changed in time for 2004, and fishermen were afraid to stop fishing or catch less fish on their own without regulatory oversight, fearing it would impact their future positions in the fishery.
The New England council has since made several changes to the Closed Area II yellowtail SAP, which should prevent such serious problems in the future – if the SAP ever opens again. NMFS has implemented these changes, including a new start date of July 1 instead of June 1.
Hall-Arber said the 2004 problems are described in the report not to assess blame to anyone, but to provide insight for the future.
“The idea is that this would be used to avoid similar problems and complications with other SAPs, not just yellowtail,” she said. “It would be fabulous if people took this to heart.”
Copies of the case study can be downloaded from the Internet at <http://web.mit.edu/seagrant/aqua/cmss/comm%20mtgs/commmtgs.html>. Scroll down to “Final Reports, Part 2 – Community Panels Project.” Under New Bedford, click on the “In Hindsight” link. Or e-mail Hall-Arber directly at <arber@mit.edu> and ask for a copy.
Janice M. Plante
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