Sep 7 2014

CHUCK DELLA SALA, JOE PENNISI, AND SHEMS JUD: Sustainability Certification Reflects Sea Change in West Coast Fisheries

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September 4, 2014 — In essence, what the trawlers of the West Coast have done under this new system is renew the social contract that they have with the public, by providing assurance that they are harvesting a public resource in a sustainable manner.

The following op-ed was submitted to Saving Seafood by Chuck Della Sala, the Mayor of the City of Monterey, California; Joe Pennisi, the owner and skipper of the F/V Pioneer; and Shems Jud, of the Environmental Defense Fund’s Oceans Program:

Most California seafood lovers are familiar with the Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Seafood Watch Consumer Guides – the booklets that recommend which fish to eat and which should be avoided.

Seafood Watch just dramatically increased its list of recommended seafood options from the West Coast. They now rank nearly all bottom trawl-caught groundfish as “good” and “best” alternatives. Those species include lingcod, chilipepper rockfish, Dover sole, and dozens more.

Readers accustomed to grim news about marine resources will find this news a pleasant surprise; but for those who closely follow commercial fisheries of the West Coast it may seem more like a miracle.

Fourteen years ago the West Coast groundfish fishery was declared a disaster by the federal government. Years of overharvesting and science and management failures had resulted in rapidly dwindling stocks as too many boats chased too few fish in a classic example of the “tragedy of the commons.” Eight species were declared overfished, and the Pacific Fishery Management Council (Council) and the National Marine Fisheries Services were scrambling – along with fishermen – to figure out some way to save a major American fishery, and one of great importance to Monterey and the region.

There’s nothing like disaster to bring unlikely partners together. In the years following the declaration it has been our privilege – fishermen, fishing communities, and conservationists, to sit together at the same table with the Council and the National Marine Fisheries Service to help develop an entirely new approach to managing one of the most complex multispecies fisheries on earth.

The quota-based management system that was eventually implemented in 2011 became known as the West Coast Groundfish Trawl Catch Share Program. It combined practical conservation incentives with a system of full accountability by putting federal observers on fishing vessels.   The program gives fishermen the flexibility to fish when the weather is right and to work with their markets to time landings to meet demand. Fishermen are also able to actively manage their portfolio of species, which has dramatically reduced both bycatch and discards.

Today, fishing businesses are slowly becoming more stable, and several of those overfished species are rebuilding at a surprisingly rapid rate.

In essence, what the trawlers of the West Coast have done under this new system is renew the social contract that they have with the public, by providing assurance that they are harvesting a public resource in a sustainable manner. The recent assessment from the Seafood Watch Program, and the June certification of thirteen species of West Coast groundfish as sustainable by the Marine Stewardship Council, verifies that.

This is an unfolding success story; West Coast fishermen still face stiff challenges. They have to pay for those observers and bear much of the cost of administering their catch share program. But the announcement by Seafood Watch signifies a remarkable course change in this fishery, a change that California seafood lovers – and that’s everybody reading this, right? – can be proud of.

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