August 2024 – Fishermens News

U.S., Canada Agree in Principle on Updates to Columbia River Treaty

An agreement in principle has been reached regarding key elements of updating the 60-year-old Columbia River Treaty to reflect changing climate and other needs of communities economically dependent on the river and its tributaries. A White House statement on negotiations issued July 11 noted the importance of the Columbia River to the U.S. economy, generating 40% of the country’s hydropower, irrigating $8 billion in agriculture products and moving 42 million tons of commercial cargo annually. The U.S. and Canada have managed the waterways jointly for 60 years. In May 2018, the two nations began negotiating to update the treaty for the next 20 years. White House officials said that in modernizing the treaty they would elevate the voices of U.S. Native tribes and Canada’s indigenous nat...

Bottom Trawling Legislation

A recently proposed piece of legislation that would block off large sections of the ocean from trawling gear is being met with opposition from more than 50 seafood organizations across the U.S. House Resolution 8507, commonly known as the Bottom Trawl Clarity Act, which was introduced in May by U.S. Rep. Mary Peltola (D-Alaska) would mandate that each of the eight Fisheries Management Councils in the U.S. that permit the use bottom trawl gear to define the terms “substantial” versus “limited” bottom contact. But more importantly, it would also require the designation of Bottom Trawl Zones, limiting the areas where gear that scrapes the seafloor is allowed. Once the zones are established, bottom trawling would only be permitted within them, potentially mitigating the environmental impac...

Homeland Security Prioritizes Efforts to Block Seafood Imports Produced By Forced Labor

Homeland Security officials have declared a top priority their efforts to block seafood produced by forced labor overseas from entering the U.S., in part by requiring better documentation from seafood supply chins. The July 9 announcement from the Department of Homeland Security added seafood to its list of high-priority sectors in the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, which is legislation that directs the agency’s Forced Labor Enforcement Task Force to block import into the United States from Chinese forced labor in the Republic of China, especially from the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, or Xinjiang. The announcement came amid extensive reports of illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing and forced labor by Chinese-flagged vessels and in Chinese-based seafood processin...

Fishermen’s Memorial for Dutch Harbor Moves Closer to Completion

A life-sized fishermen’s memorial for Dutch Harbor, Alaska honoring lives lost in pursuit of the bounty of the Bering Sea, is nearing completion, according to metal artist and longtime Unalaska resident Karel Machalek. The idea for a fishermen’s memorial originated when Machalek and his wife, Marie, visited Iceland well over a decade ago, and saw that each of the fishing communities they visited there had its own memorial to fishermen lost at sea. They decided that Dutch Harbor, the biggest fishing port in Alaska by volume of seafood harvested, needed one as well, said Marie, who serves as vice president of the non-profit Rusting Man Foundation. The in-progress memorial features life-sized statues of longline, crab and cod harvesters on an octagon shaped, five-foot high base construct...

Commerce Dept. Allocates $12M For Alaska, Wash. Fisheries Disasters

Department of Commerce officials in June announced the allocation of $12.2 million to address fishery resource disasters in Alaska and Washington state through 2022 and 2023 Disaster Relief Supplemental Appropriations Acts. The allocations for Alaska’s 2022 Kuskokwim River salmon fishery, 2021 and 2022 Upper Cook Inlet East Side Setnet salmon fishery and the Port Gamble S’Klallam Tribe’s 2021 Puget Sound fall chum and coho salmon fisheries may be used to fund commercial, recreational, tribal fishing communities and subsistence users, as well as other associated industries affected by the disaster. “This funding will assist with the recovery of salmon fisheries in communities across Alaska and Puget Sound by bolstering fisheries restoration efforts (and) minimizing the risk of future di...

Alaska Trawl Harvesters Working to Expand Electronic Pelagic Pollock Fishery Monitoring

Gulf of Alaska (GOA) trawl fishermen are working to expand electronic monitoring from the pelagic pollock fishery to the Central Gulf of Alaska rockfish program. Using electronic monitoring and other technology to provide cost-effective monitoring and better prohibited species catch accounting has always been a goal for the trawl catcher vessels, Chelsae Radell, assistant director of the Alaska Groundfish Data Bank in Kodiak, noted in the June 30 edition of the online publication EM4Fish. In 2007 and 2008, Alaska Groundfish Data Bank (AGDB) received exempted fishing permits (EFPs) to test the use of electronic monitoring to quantify at-sea halibut discards in the GOA rockfish program. While the EFPs showed that electronic monitoring was possible, limitations in its use at the time mea...

Commercial Catch of Alaska Salmon Climbs to 9.2 Million

Commercial salmon gillnetters, seiners and setnet harvesters delivered upward of 9.2 million salmon to processors through the eve of Independence Day in fisheries from the Southeast, Central and Westward regions of Alaska. Through July 1, the Alaska Department of Fish and Game’s estimated statewide harvest included 6.8 million sockeyes, 1.9 million chums, 278,000 pinks and 76,000 Chinook salmon. ADF&G earlier had forecasted harvest of all commercial species of salmon at about 135.7 million fish. In Bristol Bay, home of the world’s largest run of wild sockeye salmon, ADF&G predicted a total run of 39 million fish and a maximum daily harvest capacity of 2.36 million fish, sustainable for about 18 days. The preseason survey showed that total intended purchases were lower in 2024...

NOAA Fisheries Seeks Public Comment on Ecosystem-Based Fisheries Management Road Map

NOAA Fisheries is accepting public comment through Aug. 31 via email to nmfs.ebfm.roadmap@noaa.gov regarding its updated Ecosystem-Based Fisheries Management Road Map (EBFM), which is subject to periodic review. Ecosystem-based fisheries management is defined by NOAA as an integrated, science-based approach to fisheries management in a geographically specific area that contributes to the resilience and sustainability of the ecosystem and optimizes benefits among a diverse set of societal goals. NOAA’s first EBFM roadmap was established in 2016 to provide guidance on the agency’s policy shift toward implementing ecosystem-level planning for fisheries. This style of management involves setting quotas and also considering how individual species’ fit into the wider ecosystem, rather than ...

Effective Emergency Drills

Conducting monthly drills during the fishing season can help crew members respond more effectively to an emergency. There are hundreds of cases where fishermen attributed their survival to having conducted emergency drills. It makes sense that if you repeatedly practice actions that need to be taken in a crisis at sea, you are more likely to react in a more effective way. Monthly drills are also a requirement for documented fishing vessels operating beyond the federal boundary line or with more than 16 people onboard. 46 CFR 28.270 states: The master or individual in charge of each vessel must ensure that drills are conducted and instruction is given to each individual on board at least once each month. Instruction may be provided in conjunction with drills or at other times and places...

Vessel Hydraulic Systems Offer Smooth, Reliable Operations

Marine hydraulic systems are meant to ensure the smooth operation of a vessel, and there have been some notable case studies and new products on the market aimed at helping commercial fishing operations run more efficiently, safely and reliably. Parker Hannifin, longtime experts in engineering, motion and control technologies, delivers cylinders for steering applications on commercial vessels with Engine Monitor Inc., (EMI), a division of maritime supplier W&O. Parker Hannifin, headquartered near Cleveland, Ohio, has offices and distributors around the world. The cylinder division designs, supplies and supports hydraulic cylinders for EMI in steering and non-steering applications, Gene Chauvin, an engineer for the southern region of Parker Hannifin, explained in an email to Fisher...