WPFMC Voices Concerns Over Pacific Remote Islands Sanctuary
A proposed marine sanctuary in the Pacific Remote Islands (PRI) is being strongly criticized by the chairman of the Western Pacific Fishery Management Council (WPFMC) as potentially devastating to the economy of American Samoa.
“This top-down approach to regulating fisheries is wrong,” Council Chair Will Sword told the Council Coordination Committee (CCC) during its Oct. 11-13 meeting in Alexandria, Va. “It is completely opposite of the [Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act] process where the bottom-up approach is mandatory.”
Sword said the Biden administrations executive orders on equity and environmental justice goals “are rubbish if this sanctuary proposal becomes a reality, for there will be no commercial fishing.”
The WPFMC, commenting in an Oct. 23 s...