While the federal government reaffirmed its control of recreational red snapper management this past week, Louisiana fisheries officials also doubled down on a threat to claim three marine leagues of ocean on behalf of the state in a
n effort to wrestle away oversight of the species from the Gulf of Mexico Fisheries Management Council. Read more here
NILS STOLPE: The New England groundfish debacle (Part IV): Is cutting back harvest really the answer?
While it’s a fact that’s hardly ever acknowledged, the assumption in fisheries management is that if the population of a stock of fish isn’t at some arbitrary level, it’s because of too much fishing. Hence the term “overfished.” Hence the mandated knee jerk reaction of the fisheries managers to not enough fish; cut back on fishing. What of other factors? They don’t count. It’s all about fishing, because fishing is all that the managers can control; it’s their Maslow’s Hammer. When it comes to the oceans it seems as if it’s about all that the industry connected mega-foundations that support the anti-fishing ENGOs with hundreds of millions of dollars a year in “donations” are interested in controlling. Read the article here
Non-compliance? Well after being at a special sub-committee MRIP workshop here in NY last week, Gordon Colvin, Project Manager for MRIP, was pretty adamant in stating, that both Louisiana and Alabama may be able to take regulatory measures in their own state waters, but as soon as you go out into the EEZ, their is going to be a very big enforcement issue which fishermen would then have to deal with. Though I must admit, great to see the states finally starting to assert their rights on the issue on the use of a public resource..
Go here to see what NOAA/NMFS approves of…heavens forbid YOU kill so many fish at one time!