http://www.environmentamerica.org/home/reports/report-archives/ocean-conservation/ocean-conservation http://www.environmentamerica.org/home/reports/report-archives/ocean-conservation/ocean-conservation/the-gulf-from-overfishing-to-healthy-waters America’s oceans are home to whales, dolphins, sea turtles, fish and http://www.environmentamerica.org/home/reports/report-archives/ocean-conservation/ocean-conservation/the-gulf-from-overfishing-to-healthy-waters Fri, 06 Jun 2008 11:17:55 -0500 http://www.environmentamerica.org/home/reports/report-archives/ocean-conservation/ocean-conservation/shell-game-a-marine-fish-conservation-network-report Ocean fish are the last wild creatures that humans hunt for food on a large scale. The oceans once supplied a seemingly unending bounty of seafood, with codfish so plentiful off the coast of New England, fishermen merely needed to dip baskets into the water to catch them. Today, many of our nation’s commercially important fish populations (or what fishery managers call “stocks”) are fished at unsustainably high rates, with some, like New England cod stocks, fished down to historic lows, endangering the future of not only the fish stocks, but our nation’s fishermen.As American seafood consumption continues to rise, we need healthy, productive fish stocks to support this growing demand. Overfishing – catching fish faster than they can reproduce – threatens the vitality of our fish stocks and the fishermen who depend on them for their way of life. Twenty years of ineffective regulation of U.S. fisheries by the National Marine Fisheries Service and the regional fishery management councils led to fish stock crashes in New England, the Pacific, and other parts of the country, resulting in severe economic and ecological impacts. Congress recognized the threat posed by overfishing when it passed amendments to Magnuson Act known as the Sustainable Fisheries Act in 1996, requiring the regional fishery management councils, using guidance provided by the National Marine Fisheries Service, to define and eliminate overfishing and create plans to rebuild overfished populations within 10 years if possible. To track rebuilding progress, the Sustainable Fisheries Act also required the Secretary of Commerce to report to Congress annually on the status of each fish stock managed by the councils. This report analyzes data from the 2001 – 2004 “Status of U.S. Fisheries” reports (the most recent reports available) and action by the regional fishery management councils from 2001 – 2005 to assess the efforts made by fishery managers to eliminate overfishing and rebuild overfished stocks. Key findings of this analysis include:Progress reducing the number of stocks that are overfished and experiencing overfishing is an administrative shell game. At first glance there appears to be a declining trend in the number of stocks that are overfished and experiencing overfishing. However, administrative actions, such as dropping stocks out of the count, deciding that not enough information existed so they should be moved to the “unknown” category or collapsing many stocks into one “complex,” account for most of the declining trend: 60 percent of the overfished stocks and 75 percent of the stocks experiencing overfishing between 2001 and 2004 were taken off the list due to administrative shuffling or reclassification. In a nutshell, the number of stocks that are overfished and experiencing overfishing has not appreciably declined.By 2004, only 13 percent of the nation’s fish stocks could be considered “healthy.” The number of healthy stocks, i.e., those stocks that are both not overfished, nor experiencing overfishing, remained constant between 2001 and 2004. Not only is the number of healthy stocks very low, there has not been a discernable gain in healthy stocks between 2001-2004. Councils have a pattern of allowing overfishing to continue on overfished stocks. Many councils allowed overfishing to continue on overfished stocks between 2001 and 2004, including New England’s Georges Bank cod, Pacific groundfish, and Gulf of Mexico red snapper. As of 2004, five councils and NMFS allowed 27 overfished stocks to also be subjected to overfishing, despite legal requirements to end overfishing.Some councils refuse to accept scientific recommendations with disastrous results. Several councils have a history of refusing to accept scientific information that requires the adoption of strict conservation measures. It took a federal lawsuit to force the New England Council to adopt a plan to rebuild Georges Bank cod by 2026. The Gulf Council exceeded red snapper catch levels recommended by scientists by 50 percent and, as a result, does not expect the population to be rebuilt until 2032. It took a federal disaster declaration for the Pacific Council to finally take action to protect groundfish and, as a result, canary rockfish will not be rebuilt until 2074.Ineffective management tools are common. When councils set catch levels without a mechanism to stop fishing once the level is reached, overfishing often results. Many councils continue to use these ineffective measures, even when a stock is declared overfished. Closed areas or fishing moratoria have allowed successful rebuilding of whiting and lingcod in the Pacific, and goliath and Nassau grouper in the Gulf of Mexico. NMFS does not know if the majority of stocks it manages are overfished or experiencing overfishing. In 2004, NMFS did not know whether 70 percent of all the nation’s stocks were overfished or not. For over half of all the nation’s stocks, it does not know if they are experiencing overfishing. NMFS has worked to increase its knowledge of commercially important stocks, but knows less about so called “minor” stocks than it did four years prior.Out-of-date data is prevalent for some councils. The variance in the availability of current data for different councils is striking. The Gulf, South Atlantic and Caribbean councils work with data that is sometimes over 5 years old. While the New England, Pacific, North Pacific, and Western Pacific councils tend to work with more recent data. Ten years after the passage of the Sustainable Fisheries Act, efforts to prevent overfishing and rebuild overfished populations remain inadequate. Overfishing continues on overfished populations, while administrative changes to the status of the stocks reports mask the councils’ failures to control overfishing. Recent council actions to rebuild overfished populations are an improvement over past inaction, but still fall short of what is required to protect our nation’s fish. Councils need to move beyond adopting the easiest and most obvious measures, actively encourage better data collection, and utilize moratoria, long-term closures, and “hard” catch limits to provide the thorough levels of protection needed for sustaining fish populations for future generations.  http://www.environmentamerica.org/home/reports/report-archives/ocean-conservation/ocean-conservation/shell-game-a-marine-fish-conservation-network-report Fri, 12 Oct 2007 00:49:51 -0500 http://www.environmentamerica.org/home/reports/report-archives/ocean-conservation/ocean-conservation/turning-a-blind-eye-a-marine-fish-conservation-network-report Environment America is the new home of U.S. PIRG's environmental work. Every year, the vast fleet of trawlers, seiners, longliners, charter and private sportfishing boats, and other vessels that catch fish in our nation’s waters discard a large proportion of their catch, often dead or dying. Virtually all fisheries, no matter how selective the equipment used or area fished, catch and subsequently discard significant numbers of non-targeted species, referred to in fisheries jargon as “bycatch.” Fishermen often throw these organisms overboard because they are either too small or have little or no economic value. In the majority of fisheries, however, most discards are mandatory; federal regulations require that bycatch be returned to the ocean, as unharmed as possible. This action is intended to prevent the wanton overexploitation and potential decimation of populations of fish and other marine life, including not only finfish, shellfish, and crustaceans, but also birds, turtles, and marine mammals. Unfortunately, bycatch restrictions are often not implemented or enforced, and even if they are, a high percentage of the fish and other species that are caught and returned to the ocean do not survive. The sheer number and amount of fish and other marine life that are unintentionally caught by hooks, traps, or in fishing nets each year is staggering. In 2002, the bycatch in twenty-seven of the nation’s most important fisheries totaled more than 2 billion pounds, the equivalent by weight of over 270,000 Hummer H2 sport-utility vehicles, more than fifteen QE2 luxury liners, or 7 billion fish fillet sandwiches. The full magnitude of the problem is unknown since, with few exceptions, fisheries managers have failed to monitor bycatch, despite being required to by federal law. In order to manage our fisheries effectively, fisheries managers must account for the additional fish and other ocean wildlife killed as bycatch, so that healthy fish populations are not overfished, sensitive or depressed populations are not driven to levels below which they cannot recover, and marine ecosystems are not degraded. Without good bycatch data, we are steering blind. High rates of bycatch – and the fishing practices that cause them – can have profound ecological effects, such as the alteration of food webs, shifting predator-prey dynamics, and habitat destruction. But bycatch is not just an ecological problem. Because it often comprises younger individuals of commercially valuable species that have not yet reproduced, if not controlled and accounted for, bycatch can lead to overfishing, reduced productivity and, therefore, reduced catch level over the long term. The economic consequences for fishermen, processors, and consumers are enormous. Ten years ago, Congress amended the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act (MSA) – the cornerstone federal fisheries management law – in part to acknowledge that bycatch is a major problem with severe ecological and socio-economic consequences. Among other things, the 1996 amendments to the MSA require that federal fisheries managers minimize bycatch, minimize the mortality of bycatch that can not be avoided, and establish bycatch reporting plans for each fishery they manage. This report updates our 2001 assessment of bycatch in fisheries managed under the MSA, focusing on the last five years (2001-2006). We report on the efforts of each council to address bycatch in the nation’s “dirtiest” fisheries. These include fisheries that account for the largest quantities of fish and other marine life discarded each year (discards), and those that feature the highest rates of discards relative to the amount of catch retained (landings). In some cases, the same fisheries that discard the most fish have the lowest discard-to-landings ratios. In the worst cases, the poundage of fish discarded and discard-to-landings ratio are both high; it is in these, the dirtiest fisheries, that the failures of fisheries management are most glaring. While we found promising developments in some fisheries, the lack of progress overall toward reducing or eliminating bycatch remains poor. Given the livelihoods and resources at stake, after ten years of expense and effort, we expect better. Here is a summary of our major findings. Only one council out of eight has established a bycatch reporting plan for its fisheries that meets the requirements of the MSA. Standardized reporting is a cornerstone of information-driven, science-based management. Development of the most effective solutions to the problem requires reliable information. It is no surprise that the North Pacific Council has applied some of the most effective management measures to combat bycatch: the council has the information to back it up. Just as importantly, transparent reporting shines a light on a council’s action or inaction for stakeholders and the public to see. Without reporting, there is little incentive for councils to address the bycatch problem in a proactive way.Bycatch data collection is grossly inadequate in most fisheries. A standardized bycatch reporting methodology doesn’t help if there is no data to report. Currently, only 42 of roughly 300 federally managed fisheries have observer coverage of any kind. NMFS and the councils share responsibility for the failure to secure adequate observer coverage in most of the nation’s dirtiest fisheries. In many cases, observer coverage is less than one percent and is reliant on voluntary coverage, with few fisheries meeting the 20 percent standard recommended by scientists. NMFS’ own analysis shows the current, deplorable state of observer coverage in the nation’s fisheries and estimates the level of effort and expenditure required to correct it. Addressing this shortcoming should be priority number one for every council and NMFS region. Most councils fail to adequately incorporate quantitative bycatch estimates into management plans. This failure is a major cause of overfishing for several priority species. For fish stocks that are caught in large numbers as bycatch, this amounts to a form of off-the-books accounting where major losses are not reported as part of the bottom line. This in turn leads to rosier estimates of stock status and subsequent higher catch levels, until the fishery collapses and draconian measures are the only ones left in the toolbox. In fisheries where quantitative bycatch data are not yet being collected at a sufficient rate to permit estimates that are both accurate and precise, managers should apply a precautionary approach by assuming high rates of bycatch and adjusting target catch levels accordingly. It is possible to reduce bycatch significantly. So why are so few councils doing it? Most of the councils rely on measures to address overfishing and habitat damage - such as gear restrictions and closed areas during certain times of the year - to reduce bycatch indirectly. While these actions may well be beneficial, bycatch must be addressed head-on through directed management measures. These include modifications to existing fishing gear and development of new technologies. Managers should also create direct incentives to reduce bycatch through other measures, such as species-specific quotas on the amount of allowable bycatch, with triggers for the immediate closure of fishing seasons in affected areas. The North Pacific Council has shown that it can be done. Not all management measures will work in all contexts, but ten years after the passage of the MSA amendments, real action is long overdue http://www.environmentamerica.org/home/reports/report-archives/ocean-conservation/ocean-conservation/turning-a-blind-eye-a-marine-fish-conservation-network-report Fri, 12 Oct 2007 00:49:51 -0500 http://www.environmentamerica.org/home/reports/report-archives/ocean-conservation/ocean-conservation/net-loss-over-shing-off-the-south-atlantic-coast America’s oceans are home to whales, dolphins, fish and an enormous variety of other sea life. But today our oceans are in trouble. Destructive overfishing, pollution, and habitat damage are putting important marine animals at risk. Many populations are in serious decline. The result of this poor management is a drastic reduction in fishing opportunities for commercial and recreational fishermen. In the South Atlantic, approximately one in three (36% or 4 out of 11) of all federally managed fish stocks for which there is adequate information are depleted (i.e., overfished).1 Roughly one third (31% or 10 out of 32) stocks with adequate information are experiencing overfishing and headed in that direction. Even these numbers do not tell the whole story. The South Atlantic Fishery Management Council has sole oversight of 86 fish stocks, but it has sufficient data on very few fish stocks to know whether they are overfished or not. For example, it can only determine whether 11 out of the 86 stocks are overfished or not. We do not know which of the other 75 stocks are overfished. Many of these threatened fish are regionally popular such as the snappers and groupers that have always been a part of Low Country seafood culture. But years of overfishing and the fact that some species are slow growing and late maturing have led to substantial declines. The South Atlantic Council by and large has followed the advice of its independent scientists in setting target catch levels but refused to impose absolute limits on the amount of fish that could be caught and landed. Instead, the Council relied on managing fishing effort with limits on fish size, fishing seasons, trip limits and the like. Clearly these tactics have not worked, and fish stocks keep declining. Recently, the Council has begun to make better decisions on catch levels and fishing controls. It decided to set aside modest Marine Protected Areas (MPA’s) with the hope that some of these threatened species may begin to recover. In an effort to improve fisheries management, Congress revised the primary law governing fishing in U.S. oceans, the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act, at the end of 2006. The Act requires the National Marine Fisheries Service and the regional fishery management councils that devise and propose local plans to maintain healthy fish populations to follow new rules. These rules are now under development; and this report recommends that the new rules follow important conservation principles. http://www.environmentamerica.org/home/reports/report-archives/ocean-conservation/ocean-conservation/net-loss-over-shing-off-the-south-atlantic-coast Sun, 04 Nov 2007 20:00:57 -0600 http://www.environmentamerica.org/home/reports/report-archives/ocean-conservation/ocean-conservation/net-loss-overshing-off-the-pacic-coast America’s oceans are home to whales, dolphins, sea turtles, fish and an enormous variety of other sea life. But today our oceans are in trouble. Destructive overfishing, pollution, and habitat damage are putting important marine animals at risk. Many populations are in serious decline. The result of this poor management is a drastic reduction in fishing opportunities for commercial and recreational fishermen. On the west coast, about one in seven (14 percent or 7 out of 49) of all federally managed fish stocks for which there is adequate information are overfished.1 Approximately one in twenty (6 percent or 3 out of 49) stocks are experiencing overfishing and headed in that direction. Taken together, ten federally managed fish stocks are either depleted or experiencing overfishing. This represents 20 percent of the 49 fish stocks for which the federal government has enough information to make an assessment. In addition, another ecologically and economically valuable fish, Pacific whiting, is being driven down towards an overfished level with the help of poor decisions from the Pacific fishery management council. ‘Overfished’ typically means that a fish population has been reduced to below 20-25 percent of its original population. When eight out of ten fish of any kind are missing from the ocean, it has profoundly negative effects on the rest of the ocean’s animals like whales, dolphins, sea turtles and other fish. The ecosystem is unbalanced; predators may not find enough to eat and prey species may explode because there are not enough predators to eat them. ‘Overfishing’ means that a fish stock is being caught faster than it can replace itself and it is therefore heading towards overfished status or not recovering to healthy levels. Taken together these two terms describe fish stocks in jeopardy or threatened. In an effort to improve fisheries management, Congress revised the primary law governing fishing in U.S. oceans, the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act, at the end of 2006. The Act requires the National Marine Fisheries Service and the regional fishery management councils, which devise and propose local plans that are supposed to maintain healthy fish populations, to follow new rules. These rules are now under development; and this report recommends that the new rules follow important conservation principles. http://www.environmentamerica.org/home/reports/report-archives/ocean-conservation/ocean-conservation/net-loss-overshing-off-the-pacic-coast Sun, 04 Nov 2007 20:06:01 -0600 http://www.environmentamerica.org/home/reports/report-archives/ocean-conservation/ocean-conservation/net-loss-overshing-off-the-coast-of-new-england America’s oceans are home to whales, dolphins, fish and an enormous variety of other sea life. But today our oceans are in trouble. Destructive overfishing, bycatch (i.e., unintended catch of unwanted fish), pollution, and habitat damage are putting important marine animals at risk. Many populations are in serious decline. The result of this poor management is a drastic reduction in fishing opportunities for commercial and recreational fishermen. In New England, almost one half (44 percent or 15 out of 34) of all federally managed fish stocks for which there is adequate information are depleted (i.e., overfished).1 Approximately one third of stocks (29 percent or 9 out of 31) are experiencing overfishing and headed in that direction. Even these numbers do not tell the whole story. ‘Overfished’ typically means that a fish population has been reduced to below 20-25 percent of its original population. When eight out of ten fish of any kind are missing from the ocean, it has profoundly negative effects on the rest of the ocean’s animals like whales, dolphins, sea turtles and other fish. The ecosystem is unbalanced; predators may not find enough to eat or prey species may explode in number because their predators are gone. ‘Overfishing’ means that a fish stock is being caught faster than it can replace itself and it is therefore heading towards overfished status or it will never recover to healthy levels. Taken together these two terms describe fish stocks in jeopardy or threatened. Many of these threatened fish are regionally popular such as the cod, flounder, and halibut and part of New England seafood culture. But decades of overfishing have led to substantial declines. The New England Council often ignored the advice of its independent scientists in setting target catch levels and refused to impose absolute limits on the amount of fish that could be caught and landed. Instead, the Council relied on managing fishing effort with limits on days of fishing, fish size, fishing seasons, trip limits, closed areas, gear restrictions, and the like. Clearly these have not worked and fish stocks keep declining. The Council has recently begun to confront its problems and make wiser resource decisions. For example, actions on forage fish (herring) in the Gulf of Maine and proposed plans for groundfish like cod and flounder indicate a new found awareness that the old ways are not working. In an effort to improve fisheries management, Congress revised the primary law governing fishing in U.S. oceans, the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act, at the end of 2006. The Act requires the National Marine Fisheries Service and the regional fishery management councils that devise and propose local plans to maintain healthy fish populations to follow new rules. These rules are now under development; and this report recommends that the new rules follow important conservation principles. http://www.environmentamerica.org/home/reports/report-archives/ocean-conservation/ocean-conservation/net-loss-overshing-off-the-coast-of-new-england Sun, 04 Nov 2007 20:08:24 -0600 http://www.environmentamerica.org/home/reports/report-archives/ocean-conservation/ocean-conservation/net-loss-over-shing-off-the-gulf-coast America’s oceans are home to whales, dolphins, fish and an enormous variety of other sea life. But today our oceans are in trouble. Destructive overfishing, bycatch (i.e., unintended catch of unwanted fish), pollution, and habitat damage are putting important marine animals at risk. Many populations are in serious decline. The result of this poor management is a drastic reduction in fishing opportunities for commercial and recreational fishermen. In the Gulf of Mexico, about two thirds of the federally managed fish stocks have inadequate information to determine whether populations are healthy or not. Of those with enough information, approximately one in three (29 percent or 2 out of 7) federally managed stocks are depleted (i.e., overfished) and one in five (22 percent or 4 out of 18) federal managed stocks are experiencing overfishing. 1 Many of these fish are regionally popular, such as red snapper and gag grouper, and are part of the Gulf’s seafood culture. Years of overfishing have led to substantial declines putting the coastal economy and the favorite pastime of millions at risk. Two fish stocks for instance, red snapper and greater amberjack, serve as particularly egregious examples of prolonged, poor management by the Gulf Fisheries Management Council. A short history of some of the management failures is given. In an effort to encourage better fisheries management, Congress revised the primary law governing fishing in U.S. oceans, the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act, at the end of 2006. The Act requires the National Marine Fisheries Service and the regional fishery management councils which devise and propose local plans to follow new rules. These rules are now under development; and this report recommends that the new rules follow important conservation principles. http://www.environmentamerica.org/home/reports/report-archives/ocean-conservation/ocean-conservation/net-loss-over-shing-off-the-gulf-coast Sun, 04 Nov 2007 20:13:56 -0600 http://www.environmentamerica.org/home/reports/report-archives/ocean-conservation/ocean-conservation/net-loss-to-net-gain-improving-pacific-coast-fisheries America’s oceans are home to whales, dolphins, sea turtles, fish and an enormous variety of other sea life. But today our oceans are in trouble. Destructive overfishing, pollution, global warming and habitat damage are putting important marine animals at risk. Many populations are in serious decline. The result of this poor management is a drastic reduction in fishing opportunities for commercial and recreational fishermen. On the West Coast, about one in ten (9 percent or 5 out of 53) of all federally managed fish stocks for which there is adequate information are overfished. The Pacific Fishery Management Council (Pacific Council) is one of eight regional fishery management councils that cover U.S. coasts. Together with the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), the Pacific Council is supposed to determine how much of each type of fish can be caught on a sustainable basis and establish other types of fishing rules. http://www.environmentamerica.org/home/reports/report-archives/ocean-conservation/ocean-conservation/net-loss-to-net-gain-improving-pacific-coast-fisheries Fri, 11 Apr 2008 09:46:28 -0500