NEW YORK – US federal agency National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Fisheries [NOAA] has asked Alaskan fishermen to form cooperatives to improve the management of Pacific cod stocks.
NOAA says cod is one of the most abundant and valuable groundfish species caught off Alaska’s coast and requires a more efficient solution to regulate the harvest.
Under the new rule – Amendment 122 to the Fishery Management Plan for groundfish of the Bering Sea Aleutian Islands [BSAI] Management Area – Pacific cod harvest quota shares are issued to qualifying licence holders and processors.
Starting next year, fishermen must form cooperatives to harvest the quota under the rule, the first catch share programme implemented in Alaska since 2012.
The amount of quota share NOAA Fisheries issues will be determined by the historical participation of harvesters as well as processors. To use its quota share, an LLP licence holder must join a coop and a processor must associate with a cooperative. The percentage of the quota share pool held by each LLP license holder and processor will be combined with other participants within the cooperative.
NOAA Fisheries, after setting the Pacific cod directed fishing allowance, will issue a quota permit to cooperatives, telling them how much Pacific cod can be caught. Each cooperative internally decides how much Pacific cod each of its members’ harvests.
The programme applies only to the first two of the three fishing seasons, which run from January 20 to June 10. The third, from June 10 to November 1, remains a limited access fishery open to all trawl catcher vessels with LLP licence endorsements.
“The pace of the trawl catcher vessel fishery has contributed to an increasingly shorter season. This has decreased the value of the fishery and negatively impacted all fishery participants [vessels, motherships, shoreside processors, and communities]. It also discourages fishing practices that can minimise bycatch and threatens the sustained viability of the fishery,” says NOAA.
The goal is to improve the prosecution of the fishery, adds NOAA, by: Promoting safety and stability in the harvesting and processing sectors, minimising bycatch to the extent practicable, increasing the value of the fishery, providing for the sustained participation of fishery dependent communities, and ensuring the sustainability and viability of the resource
The Pacific Cod Trawl Cooperative Programme joins other cooperative-based programmes in Alaska – including the American Fisheries Act Programme, Crab Rationalization Program, Central Gulf of Alaska Rockfish Program, and Amendment 80 Programme.
“Generally, cooperative structures allow for more flexibility for participants throughout the fishing season,” says NOAA. “Some benefits include more efficient coordination of fishing operations, potential to reduce operational expenses, and increased quality and revenue from the product.”
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