Cutbacks would affect all sectors of the fishery — commercial, charter and recreational — and could include limiting the number of fish or pounds commercial fishermen could take, and jiggering the number or weight of individual fish taken by charter or recreational fishermen. Read more here 13:51
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
Well here we see another fishery where sporty conservation groups will achieve their “wet dream” of achieving a major reduction for the commercial sector and for-hire sub-sector in what they will be allowed to harvest during the fishing season. Even with the striped bass stock neither over fished, nor over fishing occurring at this time, the proposed mortality target has been lowered to a reference point where there is the likelihood of noticeable harvest reductions coming in 2015. Whether taken in a one year harvest cut or the reduction spread over three year period, makes you wonder “what is next” for any small fishing business to continue to stay in business.