FISHBILL-US: Fishermen, Lets unite like never before!
It becomes clearer by the day that our industry needs protection in the form of legislation for fishermen and supporting industries. While fishermen and those supporting industries are struggling to survive in various regions, many of them await federal assistance in already declared federal fishery failures, much of it beyond their control. Congress has mandated the NOAA is the agency that controls the “best available science”, while other data is not considered, by law. This must be addressed as we watch the industry retract based on the science many of us have no confidence in. They control our fate. click here to read the full post 20:22
I would like some help with finding the law that states something like this: once America is no longer fishing it must be sold to a foreign nation. I was told it was towards the end of the Magnuson-Stevens Act or possibly a commercial fishing treaty. I would like that law repealed. It might have something to do with underutilized fish stocks but I would be curious as to what that is all about.
It would be very easy for this to happen as once the fisheries are in the hands of a very few and very large bloated vessels and, then all that would need to happen is for those boats to leave for foreign waters. I would also like to see open access get a fair share (perhaps 1/3) of allowable catch as open access does not get enough to even fish for groundfish species. The trawler rationalization laws have really hurt the small artisanal fishing families.
Another idea for a fisheries law might be for government to buy back quotas from quotas holders, give the quotas back to the small fishermen and make the permits non-transferable and then future generations could become independent fishing business owners. Make limited entry but non-transferrable. A lottery to get in if one has deckhanded for 2 years much like they did with the urchin fishery in California that has been working well. As it stands now all future generations will become share-croppers if they want to fish.. This might get rid of some of the bloated corporate quota holders that now own all of the fish in the sea.
Mark Hamerdinger
Small artisinal commercial fisherman and open access non-quota or permit holder.