Author: Mark Edward Nero

Bad news for crab fishermen in Oregon was delivered on Aug. 4. On that date, the state’s Fish and Wildlife Commission voted to extend, with no sunset date, restrictive crabbing measures that were originally supposed to expire after the current season. The rules restrict the number of crab traps in the water and how deep the traps can drop in the late-season months when humpback whales are more likely to swim there. The restrictions were first put into place due to the fact that humpbacks migrate off Oregon’s coast and they, along with other types of whales, can get caught in the vertical ropes connected to the heavy traps and drag them around for an extended period of time, in the process becoming injured, starved and exhausted, leaving them susceptible to drowning. The ODFW i...

In case you missed it, the Supreme Court on May 1 agreed to take up a dispute between the Biden administration and East Coast commercial fishing companies that could eventually have a huge impact on the U.S. commercial fishing industry as a whole. The court’s eventual judgment has the potential to overrule a nearly 40-year-old decision that gives deference to federal agencies. The case, Loper Bright Enterprises et al. v. Raimondo, is expected to be heard in the Supreme Court’s next term. The court is being asked to override the 1984 Chevron v. National Resources Defense Council ruling, in which the justices determined that courts should defer to an agency’s reasonable interpretation of statutes when laws are ambiguous. The case revolves around Atlantic herring fishermen who say the Nati...

We all know that IUU (illegal, unreported and unregulated) fishing is bad for the commercial fishing industry. But a new editorial from the World Economic Forum, an international non-governmental and lobbying organization, serves as a strong reminder of the multiple reasons why. Among the reasons cited in the editorial are the physical danger to crew members, the threat to marine ecosystems and human rights abuses. The editorial, which can be found on the World Economic Forum’s website, begins with the harrowing tale of an IUU fisherman who said it had been normal for anglers to work 20 hours or more per day and that some people were driven to commit suicide or were killed trying to escape into the sea. “Illegal fishing is commonplace because no one is watching,” the fisherman, 52-yea...

Could artificial intelligence soon play a substantial role when it comes to counting catch and bycatch onboard commercial fishing vessels? Well, it might not be right around the corner, but it’s something that appears to be on the horizon. A startup co-founded by three people -- two former University of British Columbia students and one from Dalhousie University -- is working on a monitoring system that uses video and artificial intelligence to better calculate catch and bycatch for commercial fishing boats. The startup, called OnDeck Fisheries AI, is the brainchild of former UBC students Alexander Dungate and Sepand Dyanatkar, along with ex-Dalhousie student Matthew Leighton. Alexander holds a bachelor’s degree in Computer Science + Biology from the University of British Colu...