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Oregon State Working to Refine Ocean Oxygen Monitoring Sensors in Fisheries
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Oregon State Working to Refine Ocean Oxygen Monitoring Sensors in Fisheries

Researchers at Oregon State University are collaborating with industry and tribal partners to refine and expand use of oxygen monitoring sensors to be deployed in fishing pots, to learn more about changing ocean conditions. The three-year, $1.2 million Ocean Technology Transition grant, announced by the university on Feb. 27, is funded by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The dissolved oxygen sensors were initially developed by Oregon State researchers over a decade ago in response to concerns from crabbers who were pulling up pots full of dead crabs caught in hypoxic dead zones. The sensors helped them to gather information on how hypoxia, or low oxygen, is impacting crabbing in the Pacific Northwest. The oxygen sensors have proven to be an effective tool a...
Trident Investigates Reports of Human Rights Abuses by Chinese Supplier
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Trident Investigates Reports of Human Rights Abuses by Chinese Supplier

Trident Seafoods CEO Joe Bundrant says his company has suspended trade with a supplier in China after reports of human rights abuses there and has initiated its own independent inquiry regarding issues reported by an independent investigator. While its investigation is ongoing, Trident is cooperating with the Outlaw Ocean Project (OOP), based in Washington D.C., which advocates for a transparent and healthy seafood supply chain, Bundrant wrote in a statement posted on Trident’s website. Trident Seafoods, Canada’s High Liner Foods and Houston-based Sysco are among several U.S. seafood firms that have suspended ties with Chinese processors identified in the latest OOP report documenting their use of North Korean labor, in violation of United Nations sanctions and U.S. law, the onli...
IPHC Seeks Longline Tenders For 2024 Catch Protection Study
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IPHC Seeks Longline Tenders For 2024 Catch Protection Study

The International Pacific Halibut Commission is seeking tenders by March 25 for its 2024 IPHC Catch Protection Study, which has a goal of reducing marine mammal depredation of catch from longline gear. According to a notice posted online Feb. 28, the IPHC is considering only vessels with captains and crews with experience within the past five years in longline fishing, and that vessel inspection may be required prior. There is no nationality requirement of the vessels it charters for operation in any region, as long as customs and immigration regulations are followed. The IPHC is not obligated to accept the tender with the lowest bid or any tender received and intends to contract according to its best interests. The announcement stated that vessels would be rated using several...
ADF&G Plans Listening Session Re: 2022 Yukon River Salmon Fishery Disaster Spending
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ADF&G Plans Listening Session Re: 2022 Yukon River Salmon Fishery Disaster Spending

The Alaska Department of Fish and Game plans to hold a virtual listening session on March 11 to receive input on funding priorities from affected fishery participants for its $1.59 million Yukon River salmon fishery disaster spending plan. ADF&G said the department would draft an initial spend plan for that budget based on input received during the listening session and comments emailed to dfg.com.fisheriesdisasters@alaska.gov. The agency also said that it intends to use the spend plan developed for the 2020-2021 Yukon River salmon disaster as a starting point for the latest spend plan pending public comments. The state supports an open and transparent process for distributing disaster relief. Plans are to work with impacted fishery participants and NOAA Fisheries to ident...
Gig Harbor BoatShop Announces Crew Member Training Program
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Gig Harbor BoatShop Announces Crew Member Training Program

The Gig Harbor BoatShop in Gig Harbor, Wash. is offering a purse seine vessel crew member training program for four days, beginning March 26, on fundamental commercial fishing crewmember training, in the classroom and on board commercial fishing vessels. Experienced commercial fishing captains and crew will lead the hands-on program, including a U.S. Coast Guard-approved drill instructor safety-training course, Sea Safety and Survival. The goal of the program, led by veteran purse seine captain Gregg Lovrovich, is to introduce basic skills required aboard fishing vessels, primarily purse seiners, and to provide participants a window into the onboard life of a commercial fishing crewmember. The program is also intended to help commercial fishing skippers find qualified crew can...
From the Editor: Fishing Restrictions Bill
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From the Editor: Fishing Restrictions Bill

The future of commercial gillnet fishing and the catching of giant sea bass in California are now in doubt, following legislation proposed by a state Assembly member in February that would restrict certain types of fishing in state waters. Assembly Bill 2220 would do three things: completely ban commercial fishing for sea bass, eliminating current exceptions; ban the use of gill nets, also eliminating current exceptions, and mandate that commercial fishing vessels operating with a state permit carry an independent third-party observer onboard while operating within state fisheries. If passed and signed into law, the proposed legislation, which was drafted by Assemblyman Steve Bennett (D-Ventura), could have a sizable impact – financially and in other ways – on the state’s commercial ...
Marine Debris Foundation Establishing Headquarters in Juneau
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Marine Debris Foundation Establishing Headquarters in Juneau

The Marine Debris Foundation (MDF), established by Congress as a public-private partnership with NOAA’s Marine Debris Program, will have its headquarters in Juneau, Alaska on the campus of the University of Alaska College and Fisheries and Ocean Sciences, it was announced Feb. 21. The foundation, based alongside the fisheries college and the University of Alaska Southeast, has enormous potential, said Sen. Dan Sullivan, R-Alaska, who made the announcement in his annual address to the Alaska Legislature. “NOAA's program is our nation's sole government agency exclusively focused on the complex issue of marine debris,” the foundation’s executive director, Susan R. Sherman, said. “Government agencies typically enter into public-private partnerships like this one to expand the scop...
British Columbia Commercial Vessel Master Fined for Illegal Fishing
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British Columbia Commercial Vessel Master Fined for Illegal Fishing

Sentencing has been handed down to the master of the commercial prawn fishing vessel Darkstar following a long-running court case over illegal fishing in British Columbia’s Strait of Georgia, Canada’s Department of Fisheries and Oceans revealed Feb. 23. Judge S.M. Merrick has sentenced the vessel master to pay a fine of $250,000 and forfeit all gear seized (with an approximate value of $80,000) after previously finding him guilty on May 24, 2023 of a total of 13 violations of Canada’s Fisheries Act. On July 2 and July 3, 2020, Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO) Conservation and Protection fishery officers seized the vessel master’s prawn traps, which were illegally set in the Strait of Georgia Glass Sponge Reef Marine Refuges near Sechelt. This area is protected and closed to all ...
Coast Guard Intercept Yields Cocaine Stash Valued at Over $143 Million
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Coast Guard Intercept Yields Cocaine Stash Valued at Over $143 Million

A U.S. Coast Guard cutter in pursuit of a suspected vessel during a counter-narcotics patrol in the Eastern Pacific Ocean recovered 4,950 kilos of cocaine valued at over $143 million, Coast Guard officials said Monday, Feb. 26. The interdiction by the Coast Guard cutter Alert, on its last patrol out of its current homeport in Astoria, Ore., is among the Coast Guard’s largest single intersections in the Eastern Pacific and represents a major blow to criminal organizations attempting to smuggle illicit narcotics through the maritime domain, the Guard has said. The mission also serves as the capstone in Alert’s time in the Coast Guard Pacific Area. The Alert is to shift homeport in June to be stationed in Cape Canaveral, Fla. as part of the larger Coast Guard Force Alignment Initiat...
BBRSDA Selects New Executive Director
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BBRSDA Selects New Executive Director

Seafood industry veteran Lilani Dunn has been promoted to executive director of the Bristol Bay Seafood Development Association (BBSDA), which represents drift gillnetters harvesting the world’s largest sockeye salmon fishery. Her appointment was announced on Feb. 21.  She succeeds Andy Wink, of Wink Research & Consulting, who served as executive director of the BBRSDA for five-and-a-half years. Dunn joined the BBRSDA in 2020 to oversee the association’s salmon marketing efforts, after holding positions with the Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute (ASMI) and Orca Bay Foods. She is the president of Northwest Fisheries Association, a member of the National Fisheries Institute, and serves as chair of ASMI’s domestic marketing committee. “The marketing program is our single ...