Article Category: News

A partnership between federal and state agencies with local fishermen is underway to find answers to a decline of Chinook salmon populations on Alaska’s Yukon River. The partnership research involves NOAA Fisheries, Alaska Department of Fish and Game and the Yukon Delta Fisheries Development Association. It’s now part of NOAA’s new Citizen Science Strategy, released in January, in which community-based collaborations increase the cost effectiveness of projects and provide hands-on science, technology, engineering and math learning. They also connect the public directly with NOAA science missions. The combined efforts of NOAA Fisheries and YDFDA proved particularly valuable last year, when the COVID-19 pandemic shut down NOAA’s ability to conduct fieldwork. COVID restrictions in place t...

Rutgers University researchers have for the first time sequenced genomes from Atlantic cod, drawing information that may have implications for other fish maturing earlier as a result of fishing. Author Malin Pinsky, an associate professor in the School of Environmental and Biological Sciences at Rutgers-New Brunswick, says there is evidence that many species of fish are maturing earlier as a result of fishing, including haddock, European plaice, whiting, American plaice, sole and sockeye salmon. The study, led by Rutgers and the University of Oslo, concludes that overfishing likely did not cause the Atlantic cod to evolve genetically and mature earlier. “Evolution has been used in part as an excuse for why cod and other species have not recovered from overfishing,” Pinsky said. “Ou...

Legislation introduced in the U.S. House on Tuesday, May 11, aims to end illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing, expand transparency and stop seafood fraud, while also strengthening U.S. leadership on issues threatening oceans, consumers and human rights. The Illegal Fishing and Forced Labor Prevention Act, introduced by Rep. Jared Huffman, D-CA, and Rep. Garret Graves, R-LA, makes specific reference to the need to halt the mislabeling of seafood products, including complying with the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act, Lacey Act amendments of 1981 and other federal laws, plus an end to oppressive child labor, other forced labor and human trafficking. Up to one-third of the annal global seafood catch — as much as 56 billion pounds — is estimated to be a p...

Senators from Alaska, Hawaii and Virginia have joined forces in a resolution calling on the U.S. Senate to ratify the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). Senators Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), Mazie Hirono (D-HI) and Tim Kaine (D-VA) introduced the resolution in the Senate on May 18. A similar resolution was introduced in the U.S. House in April by Representatives Joe Courtney (D-CT) and Don Young (R-AK). UNCLOS, which is already ratified by 166 nations and the European Union, details rights and responsibilities of countries regarding the world’s oceans, including guidelines for businesses and management of marine natural resources. Hirono noted that the world currently is facing challenges from those seeking to prevent international freedom of navigation worldwide, incl...

Board members of Elliott Bay Design Group in Seattle have named Robert Ekse as president, succeeding Brian King, who most recently served as president and chief engineer. King, who is retiring after 33 years with the firm, plans to still remain active in EBDG projects on a limited capacity. Ekse was promoted from director of project operations to president, while remaining a principal of the firm. He now directly supervises the company’s business affairs, including subsidiary company SeeSaw Services. He also has assumed responsibility for advancing EBDG’s major strategic objectives while leading team planning in business management, engineering, personnel development and sales. Ekse has 30 years’ experience in the maritime industry, including prior employment with Vigor, Alaska Marine H...

Bipartisan legislation introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives recently would strengthen NOAA’s response to sexual assault and sexual harassment and offer more resources for survivors. The NOAA Sexual Harassment and Assault Prevention Improvements Act was introduced by Representatives Jared Huffman, D-CA, Suzanne Bonamici, D-OR, Don Young, R-Alaska, and Jenniffer Gonzalez-Colon, R-Puerto Rico. The legislation would expand coverage of NOAA’s sexual harassment prevention and response policy and direct NOAA to provide a clear mechanism for anonymous reports of sexual harassment. It would also strengthen advocacy resources for survivors and provide them a secure reporting structure. Additionally, the bill would also improve the ability of NOAA’s Office of Law Enforcement to enforce ...

Northern and central coasts of California are opening up to commercial scale wind energy projects under a plan announced Tues., May 25 by the Biden Administration. White House officials said the move to catalyze offshore wind energy is part of the president’s commitment to build new American infrastructure and a clean energy future that creates good paying, union jobs. The Interior Department, in coordination with the Defense Department, has identified the Morro Bay 399 area to support three gigawatts of offshore wind on roughly 399 square miles off of California’s central coast region, northwest of Morro Bay. The two areas would potentially enable development of a significant new domestic clean energy resource for years to come, White House officials said. Interior Secretary Deb Haalan...

NOAA Fisheries is seeking public comment through Aug. 5 on a draft programmatic environmental impact (PEIS) statement evaluating the potential environmental impacts of a management program for offshore aquaculture in federal waters of the Pacific Island Region. The area includes the Hawaiian Islands, Guam, Cnmi in the Northern Mariana Islands and American Samoa. The draft PEIS analyzes the potential direct, indirect and cumulative impacts of several management alternatives on the human, physical and biological environment. NOAA officials say they will consider all comment in any final PEIS and within future management action by NOAA Fisheries and the Western Pacific Fishery Management Council. Any future aquaculture management program would be designed to regulate, manage and promote de...

U.S. Department of Agriculture officials plan to purchase $70.9 million worth of seafood harvested in U.S. waters for domestic food assistance programs in what Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack says is the largest single seafood purchase in the agency’s history. Bids were being solicited online via the Web-Based Supply Chain Management (WBSCM) system and on the Agricultural Marketing Service›s website at www.ams.usda.gov/selling-food, with deliveries expected to begin in mid-August. Seafood purchases all from domestic waters include $25 million for Gulf of Mexico and South Atlantic wild caught shrimp, $20 million for Alaska Pollock, $9 million for Pacific whiting fillets, $8.9 million for sockeye salmon and $4 million each for Pacific pink shrimp and Pacific rockfish fillets. Lori Steel...

A complaint filed with NOAA Fisheries contends that the agency paved the way for collapse of the Alaska red king crab fishery by sampling bias and data falsification, which inflated annual population estimates and led to years of overfishing. The complaint was filed through Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) by Braxton Dew, a now-retired fisheries biologist who spent 25 years with NOAA Fisheries. NOAA officials said they are looking into the matter and would respond within guidelines of the formal review process. According to the complaint, National Marine Fisheries Service corrupted its standard systematic sampling design during the 1970s by conducting extra, non-random trawl sampling in areas known from previous surveys to be prime habitat for large male king cra...