Oceans Plan Meets Wave of GOP Resistance

 

  Congressional Quarterly Weekly – IN FOCUS

June 4, 2012 – Page 1137

  By Lauren Gardner | Staff Writer

 

Some lawmakers predict the new ocean policy will inevitably lead to new strict regulations on offshore drilling, wind power, commercial and recreational fishing, and boating.

On its face, the Obama administration’s plan to begin implementing its National Ocean Policy looks like something even the president’s most ardent opponents might like. The objective sounds innocuous enough safeguard the oceans and Great Lakes while encouraging sustainable development of offshore resources. The plan aims to achieve that goal by coordinating the many federal agencies that enforce the 140 laws affecting the oceans, coastlines and Great Lakes and by streamlining the process for granting various permits.ut President Obama’s critics in Congress are suspicious about the plan — and are aggressively moving to block it.

 

House Natural Resources Chairman Doc Hastings, a Washington Republican, fears the blueprint will usher in ocean “zoning.” Texas Republican Bill Flores succeeded in attaching a rider to the fiscal 2013 Commerce-Justice-Science appropriations bill that would bar any expenditures to implement the ocean policy, and Hastings vows to press for similar language in every spending bill that comes to the House floor.

 

The opposition reflects concerns by many of the industries that make a living in the coastal waters — including oil and natural gas producers, commercial fishermen and seafood processors, boat owners and operators, shippers, and sports fishermen. An industry-backed group called the National Ocean Policy Coalition backs efforts to delay the policy through appropriations riders, saying that “further policy development and implementation should be suspended until Congress, user groups, and the public have been fully engaged and all potential impacts have been assessed and are understood.”

 

Critics worry that the administration will pay for its initiative by siphoning money from programs that lawmakers intended to fund, and they complain that the White House is moving forward without congressional authorization. Some lawmakers predict the plan, which is expected to be put in final form this summer, will inevitably lead to new regulations that further burden business activities including offshore drilling, wind power, commercial and recreational fishing, deep-sea fish farming, and boating.

 

Spearheading support for an ocean policy are environmental groups such as Oceana, the Ocean Conservancy and the Pew Environmental Group — a roster that invites the suspicions of industry groups.

 

Even the co-chairmen of the Senate Oceans Caucus are divided. Rhode Island Democrat Sheldon Whitehouse calls the proposal a “very pro-business and very sensible means for rationally sorting out conflicting uses in a really important resource.” But Alaska Republican Lisa Murkowski says flatly: “I don’t like it.”

 

“They’ve got an idea that sounds nice on paper, establishes all kinds of different programs,” she says. “And again, we’ve had no sense of funding or real direction.”

 

 Read the rest of the article on CQWeekly.com

 

Fish on Fridays: Long-Term Fishery Investments Starting to Pay Off

By Michael Conathan | Director of Oceans Policy at the Center for American Progress.

See which fish stocks were fully rebuilt in 2011.

Earlier this month, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration released its annual “Status of Stocks” report to Congress outlining the overall health of our nation’s fisheries. To the relatively small cadre of fish geeks (myself included), the release of this document is a major event. It lacks the panache of the Oscar nominations, but for us it is perhaps comparable to the way the 1 percent gets all giddy for Berkshire Hathaway’s annual letter to shareholders.

NOAA’s report for 2011, similar to that of Warren Buffett’s financial powerhouse, continued its recent trend of positive returns. The topline numbers showed modest yet continued growth in the overall health of America’s fish populations. At the end of 2011, just 14 percent of fish stocks were subject to overfishing, and 21 percent were in an overfished state—down from 16 percent and 22 percent in 2010, respectively. (Recall this description of the difference between a stock that is “subject to overfishing” and one that is “overfished.”)

Yet the most impressive news to emerge from this year’s report was that six stocks have been declared fully rebuilt—more than in any other year—bringing the overall total of stocks rebuilt since 2000 to 27.

Despite these positive trends and all the feel-good stories the report has spawned (in more than 100 newspapers nationwide), correspondence in my personal inbox this week was dominated by references to a Washington Post Wonk Room blog post proclaiming boldly that it had found “The end of fish, in one chart.”

The chart in question comes from a wide-ranging World Wildlife Fund study on global biodiversity, and it displays the dramatic increase in global fishing pressure from 1950 to 2006. The blog piece goes on to reference an overpublicized doomsday scenario article published by lead author Dr. Boris Worm in 2006 in the journal Science. Worm’s study predicts the demise of global commercial fisheries by 2048. Ah, how the mass media truly loves a ticking clock.

The rest of that story, as I explained in an earlier column, is that Worm later collaborated with several other colleagues, including Dr. Ray Hilborn, on a follow-up article that Scienceran in 2009 showing a far rosier outlook on the future of the world’s fisheries—specifically that “conservation objectives can be achieved by merging diverse management actions, including catch restrictions, gear modification, and closed areas.” Sound management practices mean fishery rebuilding is possible.

And that’s precisely what we’re now seeing in domestic fisheries with the slow but steady recovery of fish populations. Our regulations are working—at least for the fish. Yet as always, we must continue to seek the balance between regulations that work for the fish and for the fishermen.

Hilborn hit this point perfectly with an op-ed he co-authored for The New York Times earlier this week with his colleague and wife, Ulrike Hilborn. Their point, similar to one I made in this series four weeks ago, is that when we as consumers eschew overfished fisheries that are in the process of rebuilding under strictly enforced science-based catch limits, we unnecessarily penalize fishermen who are acting in the best interests of the ecosystem, coastal communities, and our national economy.

Americans should not feel guilty about eating domestically produced seafood, as long as we keep strict regulations in place that reflect the best available science and that continue working toward the rebuilding goal achieved in 2011 by six different fish stocks.

 Read the full article on American Progress.

 

 

Whole Foods Is Wrong Says Industry, Environmentalists, Scientists, Congress and Government Data

Note: The article below is a companion piece that compliments Ray Hilborn's article, Eat Your Hake and Have It, Too. Although the focus of this article is on east coast species, there are also a few species on the west coast that have received less than favorable ratings on the Seafood Watch Card.

“I haven't been judged by this many people since I forgot my canvas bags at Whole Foods.” 

 

- Character of Mitchell Pritchett, ABC’s “Modern Family”


by Bob Vanasse and John Cooke |  Saving Seafood Staff

WASHINGTON – For some time, Whole Foods Market has used green issues as part of its marketing effort, appealing to the legitimate concerns of its customers for environmental protection and sustainability.  On a recent episode of ABC’s hit series “Modern Family”, the character of Mitchell Pritchett, played by Jesse Tyler Ferguson, delivered a punch line about shopping-bag sanctimony in the store’s check out lines.  On Earth Day of this year, Whole Foods extended the sanctimony to their fish counters, announcing they would no longer allow their customers to buy fish rated “red” by the Monterey Bay Aquarium and the Blue Ocean Institute.Since that policy was introduced on Earth Day, industry leaders, environmental advocates, fisheries scientists, and lawmakers have gone on record either directly opposing – or presenting information raising serious questions and doubts about – the “red” sustainability ratings.  In addition, information made public by the federal government, through the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), directly contradicts many of the Monterey Bay Aquarium and Blue Ocean assertions.Michael Conathan of the Center for American Progress wrote, “Whole Foods’ decision to cast its sustainability lot with national organizations that fail to account for the localized impacts of their policy pronouncements also speaks directly to the broader problem of the consolidation of our food-purchasing decisions. Policies set at a corporate level will inherently be made in the best interests of the company. Environmental health or animal cruelty issues may play a role, but at the end of the day the decision will come down to what’s best for the company’s bottom line.”

Ray Hilborn, professor of Aquatic and Fisheries Sciences at the University of Washington and author, along with his wife Ulrike Hilborn, of Overfishing: What Everyone Needs to Know, published in 2012 by Oxford University Press, is highly critical of the science behind Monterrey Bay Aquarium and Blue Ocean Institute’s ratings. In an op-ed in the New York Times, the Hilborns write that the ratings “are based on a misunderstanding of what constitutes a sustainable fishery. The fact is that we can harvest a certain fraction of a fish population that has been overfished, if we allow for the natural processes of birth and growth to replace what we take from the ocean and to rebuild the stock.”They go on to write that American fisheries are some of the best managed in the world, and that in the last 11 years NOAA has declared 27 species rebuilt to healthy levels. They note that even species that are considered overfished are governed by catch limits to ensure sustainability, and “there were no apparent conservation benefits from the refusal of consumers to buy those overfished species.”The Hiborns’ claims are backed up by data from NOAA’s Fish Watch, a program by NOAA Fisheries to provide seafood consumers with the most up-to-date information on seafood sustainability. According to NOAA, several of the red-rated (“avoid”) seafood species on Monterrey Bay Aquarium and Blue Ocean Institute’s seafood list are not as threatened as their ratings would suggest. Rather, these species are heavily regulated to ensure their conservation and rebuilding.Read the full article on SavingSeaFood.

 

 

California is Global Leader in Managing Forage Fish

 

Note: This article also appeared in the Santa Cruz Sentinel, North County Times, Salinas Californian, and online, on Saving Seafood and Science 2.0.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Written By Steve Scheiblauer

 More than 150 years ago, immigrant Chinese fishermen launched sampans into the chilly waters of Monterey Bay to capture squid. The Bay also lured fishermen from Sicily and other Mediterranean countries, who brought round-haul nets to fish for sardines. This was the beginning of the largest fishery in the western hemisphere – California’s famed ‘wetfish’ industry, imprinted on our collective conscience by writers like John Steinbeck. Who doesn’t remember Cannery Row? It was the plentiful schools of fish – especially sardines that stretch from the Gulf of California to Alaska during cycles of abundance – that provided opportunity for generations of enterprising fishing families to prosper. These families helped build not only Monterey, but the ports of many other California cities, like San Diego, San Francisco and San Pedro – the fishing hub of Los Angeles. But now, this historic industry – named for the fish that were canned wet from the sea – is under attack by extremist groups who claim overfishing is occurring.   That allegation is false;  fishermen have long recognized that a sustainable fishery was good for both people and fish. When the sardine resource began its storied decline in the late 1940s, wetfish fishermen levied an assessment on their catch and contributed to the beginning of the California Cooperative Fisheries Investigations (CalCOFI).  A cooperative effort between the National Marine Fisheries Service, Scripps Institution of Oceanography and the Department of Fish and Game, CalCOFI now is one of the preeminent research efforts worldwide. Research has since documented the dynamic fluctuations in coastal pelagic ‘wetfish’ stocks, including sardine and anchovy, which alternate their cycles of abundance - sardines favoring warm water epochs and anchovy preferring cold. Core samples from an anaerobic trench in the Southern California Bight found alternating layers of sardine and anchovy scales over a period of 1,400 years.  Turns out, sardine stocks would have declined naturally even without fishing pressure. Today the wetfish industry maintains its commitment to research with cooperative efforts ongoing for both sardine and squid. Even though the canneries are gone due to their inability to compete on a now global marketing stage, our wetfish industry is still the backbone of California’s fishing economy – responsible for more than 80 percent of the volume and more than 40 percent of dockside value in 2010. Fast forward to earlier this month, when an in-depth study by a panel of 13 hand-picked scientists provided recommendations on policies to protect forage fish – like anchovy, sardines and market squid – that larger species feed on. The study by the Lenfest Forage Fish Task Force concluded that overfishing of forage species is unfortunately occurring on a global scale. But interestingly, these scientists also identified the west coast, as different, noting that California is, “ahead of other parts of the world in how it manages some forage fish.” The region has “stricter monitoring and more conservative limits that could serve as a buffer against future crashes.” The Lenfest Report provides a strong case that forage fish are managed better in California and the Northern California Current than anywhere else in the world.  Overall, forage fisheries here account for less than two percent of total forage production (including both fished and unfished stocks), leaving 98 percent for other marine life. Knowledgeable people understand that this is no accident. Fishing families have worked and are working with regulators to conserve California’s fisheries and coastal waters. In fact, after a 20-year moratorium on sardine fishing, California adopted strict fishing regulations when the sardine resource rebounded. The federal government assumed management of coastal pelagic species in 1999 and approved a visionary management strategy for the west coast ‘forage’ fish harvest, maintaining at least 75 percent of the fish in the ocean to ensure a resilient core biomass. The sardine protection rate is even higher at about 90 percent. Even so, some environmental groups are calling for deep and unnecessary cutbacks in sardine fishing in California, as well as substantial harvest reductions in other forage fish fisheries, including herring, anchovies and squid. Touting studies with faulty calculations, activists are lobbying federal regulators to massively limit fishing, if not ban these fisheries outright. Apparently the facts don’t matter to groups with an anti-fishing agenda. Their rhetoric leaves those not familiar with the fishing industry with the impression that overfishing is a huge problem in California. We hope decision makers will see through the rhetoric when developing harvest policy for California’s historic, and still important, wetfish fisheries. Ed's Note: Steve Scheiblauer is the harbmaster for the city of Monterey.

 

Read the full opinion piece online on Capital Weekly.

 

NOAA Proposes Removing Eastern Steller Sea Lions from Endangered Species List

Stellar Sea Lions

Juneau, AK – NOAA is proposing to remove the eastern Steller sea lion, currently deemed "threatened," from the list of endangered wildlife, after a status review by its biologists found the species is recovering sufficiently.

"This proposal reflects the continued recovery of the eastern population of Steller sea lions and the strong conservation partnership among NOAA Fisheries, the states, the fishing industry, and other stakeholders," said NOAA's Fisheries Service Alaska Regional Administrator Jim Balsiger.

NOAA Fisheries began a draft status review of the eastern population, which ranges from Alaska's Cape Suckling to California's Channel Islands, in June 2010, and opened a 60-day public comment period. Within a few days, NOAA received two petitions, one from the states of Washington and Oregon, and the other from the state of Alaska, asking that the eastern Steller sea lion be removed from threatened status under the Endangered Species Act.

The draft status review, which was completed in March 2012, shows the eastern Steller sea lion population has met the recovery criteria outlined in the recovery plan, which was developed by NOAA Fisheries in 1992 and revised in 2008.

There were approximately 34,000 eastern Steller sea lions in 1997, when the eastern and western stocks were found to be genetically different from each other. Estimates in 2010 put the eastern population at about 70,000.

The western stock, which ranges from Alaska as far as the Russian Pacific coast, will retain its endangered status.

Read the full news release on the NOAA's website.

 

House Panel Drafting Magnuson Reforms

By Richard Gaines | Staff Writer

The U.S. House Natural Resources Committee is drafting "a comprehensive" change to the Magnuson-Stevens Act, a fisheries management law, in an attempt to ensure that NOAA makes "informed decisions based on sufficient scientific information," Chairman Doc Hastings has told the Times.Incorporating elements from a suite of eight bills vetted by the committee last December, the federal legislation has been in construction by committee staff for some time — before a national fishermen's rally at the Capitol last month and an April 3 letter to the committee from 21 House members. Those signers included John Tierney, who represents Cape Ann, and Barney Frank, whose district includes New Bedford.A mix of about two dozen federal lawmakers of both parties and houses of Congress including Sens. John Kerry and Scott Brown, spoke to the rally of the need for writing flexibility into the Magnuson-Stevens Act.Along with rewriting parts of and writing inserts to Magnuson, the committee is reported to be struggling with the problem of trying to fix misinterpretations of the overriding fisheries management law by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.Crystal Feldman, the committee press secretary, said some problems with fisheries management have been created by NOAA's interpretation of the law and not necessarily by the law itself, and that is harder to fix legislatively.Similar complaints are at the core of a lawsuit initiated by the fishing ports of New Bedford and Gloucester and industry interests from Maine to North Carolina. That appeal is now before the U.S. First Circuit Court of Appeals in Boston.

 

Read the rest of the article on Gloucester Times.

 

PG&E tests bad for sea life and also for fishing industry

 Written By Brian StacyFOR much of the 20th Century Southern California was a world leader in seafood production. The once-thriving tuna fishing fleet, based at the Port of Los Angeles and in San Diego, plied distant waters for months at a time returning to local canneries that employed thousands of people.Today, the U.S. tuna industry is a distant memory, the victim of subsidized foreign competition, unfair trade practices, government over-regulation, and in some cases under-regulation.Historically, California's commercial fishing industry once employed tens of thousands of people in fishing, fish processing, boat building and boat repair and allied industries. Recreational fishing has been a staple of the coastal tourism. Both have been a vibrant part of the California coastal economy, from Eureka to the Mexican border.I fish the waters of the central California coast. Those of us who remain, men and women who work at sea and harvest many of the types of fish we find in the supermarkets and in restaurants, have to be creative, nimble, and able to adapt to a sometimes harsh natural and political environment.It is infuriating when yet another hurdle is erected making it nearly impossible for us to practice our trade. But this time it isn't Mother Nature, imported farm-raised fish, or some government edict. This time it is a public utility - Pacific Gas & Electric, the energy behemoth whose aged gas lines exploded and ravaged the San Bruno community in 2010.PG&E also owns the Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant, on the San Luis Obispo County coast. Diablo Canyon now threatens the central coast fishing industry, the local marine environment, and the livelihood of both commercial and recreational fishers.Read the rest of the article on Los Angeles Daily News.  

Federal Government Holds Hearing on the National Ocean Policy's Effect on Fishing

On March 22, 2012, the House Natural Resources Subcommittee on Fisheries, Wildlife, Oceans & Insular Affairs held an oversight hearing titled Empty Hooks: The National Ocean Policy is the Latest Threat to Access for Recreational and Commercial Fishermen. During that hearing, George Mannina testified on exactly what policy decisions are having on fishing in the United States. See his testimony below:

Testimony of George J. Mannina, Jr.

Before the Subcommittee on Fisheries, Wildlife, Oceans, and Insular Affairs Regarding National Ocean Policy

March 22, 2012

Mr. Chairman and distinguished members of this Subcommittee, I am pleased to be here today.  I was privileged to serve as Counsel to this Subcommittee for eight years prior to becoming the Chief Counsel and Staff Director for the Republican members of the House Merchant Marine and Fisheries Committee before it was merged into the Committee on Natural Resources.  During my years with the Subcommittee and Committee, and since that time, I have worked on numerous ocean policy issues.  I am testifying today in my individual capacity and not on behalf of any client or of my firm, Nossaman LLP, although one of our associates, Audrey  Huang, has worked with me on this testimony.Read Mannina's full testimony here.