Groundfishermen are in the midst of one of the biggest changes is fisheries management in decades. Starting May 1, a new management plan takes effect, allowing commercial fishermen to organize in “sectors,” to manage an allocation of fish. A sector is a group of fishermen and is not based on a geographical area. The new rules were adopted because the current days-at-sea system was not working. Year after year, fishermen had their days-at-sea cut and trips limited, and yet groundfish stocks did not rebuild. The groundfish industry was slowly being bled to death.
So far there are 18 New England sectors, with about 700 groundfish permits. Each sector will have an allocation of fish to manage, and each fisherman will be signing a binding contract not to exceed that quota. Fishermen in a sector can fish when they want, how they want, as long as they don’t go over their quota for the year. Fishermen and cooperatives will be able to trade, lease or buy fishing allocations to modify poor allocations.
Many see this system as a way to give fishermen more flexibility and more power in the way they fish. And as long as all the fishermen in the group follow the rules, that group should be able to keep its allocation. Using this system, fishermen in sectors should be able to plan their fishing over the course of a year. By giving more control back to the fishermen, they should be able to fish more efficiently, but they will also have to be made accountable for fishing within strict limits.
Groups of fishermen now have the chance to try innovative methods of fishing and marketing that were not possible in the old system. We believe the new system is the best solution to protect smaller fishermen, who can now unite in groups, with much greater power to impact fisheries management as having one voice in18 rather than being just one in 1,200.
As with any change, many are unhappy with the new rules. The allocations given to sectors is based on total catch figures from a period between 1996 to 2006. Some fishermen question how these allocations were determined and feel the New England Fishery Management Council voted on a time period that doesn’t accurately reflect the catch of the entire New England Groundfishing Fleet. Many feel that this period inherently rewards bigger boats that caught more during this period. They feel that the new system will result in a consolidation of the industry to just a few large boats, owned by big companies. At the end of October, a protest against the new rules was held by fishermen from around New England at the National Marine Fishery Service office in Gloucester. While some fishermen are protesting this new option of management many fishermen are ready to give something new a try.
While transition to the new rules may be difficult, it has got to be an improvement over the old system. In 2009, the average boat had 39 days to fish. Even if sectors were not adopted, day-at-sea in 2010 are cut to just 24.2 with a 24-hour clock.
In Maine, we were looking at the complete elimination of groundfish boats from local harbors. The days-at-sea system resulted in more and more boats leaving Maine for homeports in southern New England. The number of boats landing in Maine has declined from several hundred 20 years ago to about 60 in 2008.
The groundfish industry in Maine is at the end of the line.
As a new option, sectors gives groups of fishermen a better shot of surviving. It is not a panacea-the groundfishing industry in New England is in such bad shape that boats will go out of business, even using the sectors option. However, at least this option offers fishermen some hope so that we may continue to have fish landed at our local ports.