Magnuson Needs Congressional Attention

by Brian Rothschild

In an article titled, “The Magnuson Act: It’s a keeper” published in the media outlet Roll Call, Eric Schwaab and Bill Hogarth’s postulation that the current fisheries management regime is a success built on sound science is blatantly false and amounts to no more than agency-based rhetoric rather than reality.

The secretary of Commerce has declared seven fisheries-related economic disasters spanning from New England, down the East Coast, into the Gulf of Mexico and along the Pacific Coast to Alaska.

The problem is that the writers use only a single metric of performance: whether or not a stock is overfished. But other metrics, such as rampant underfishing and the destruction of fishing communities, measure a fishery management regime’s success, too. Losses from underfishing and fishing community destruction in New England alone amount to hundreds of millions of dollars per year. The examples Schwaab and Hogarth use are also misleading. The purported successful management of the red snapper fishery has led to recreational fishermen in the Gulf of Mexico being allowed to fish for only a dozen days a year. Additionally, university-industry interaction, not the management system, spurred advances in New England’s scallop fishery.

Often a stock is classified as “overfished” because of unreliable science, not fishing industry actions. In New England, the groundfish fleet is not fishing, and boats are tied up in our harbors. Yet, the industry continues to be held responsible and told it is “overfishing.” One of two things is happening here: Either the government’s population estimates are wrong, or there are other factors affecting the stocks, or perhaps both. The agency has failed to look into the potential causes in sufficient detail.

Outdated and stale scientific data, data collection methods, and analysis techniques have much to do with these economic disasters. In most regions of the country, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration rarely, if ever, considers information from collaborative research and scientific studies from outside sources. In New England, there has been a total failure at managing important aspects of the multispecies groundfish fishery. Unreliable science and the lack of transparency and collaboration led to the groundfish fishery being declared an economic disaster in 2012. Such a failure has been admitted by the agency, yet it has not taken effective steps to rectify its failure. In point of fact, we see court cases throughout the country challenging NOAA’s “best available scientific information” on a regular basis.

At present, approximately 91 percent of the seafood consumed in the United States is imported. One can hardly classify this influx as a result of well-managed fisheries that “provide fresh, local seafood to consumers.”

Current fisheries policies are leading to a consolidation of the industry where large corporations and hedge funds are now buying up fishing permits and companies, moving processing plants overseas, and controlling a majority of the seafood market. The image of a fisherman going out to sea on his or her vessel with four or five crew members, who all get a percentage of the catch, is a thing of the past for many areas of the nation. No longer can a young, hard-working individual buy a boat and put in an honest day’s work to help feed his or her community. Today, to enter the fishing industry, an individual must have a significant amount of money available to buy permits. This phenomenon is not unique to one area of the country; it has occurred and is occurring throughout the nation.

The only partial truth told in the article is that upon the passage of the Magnuson Act in 1976 the government provided ”subsidies and other programs to provide access to and manage what was perceived as a near-limitless supply of fish.” The purpose of the act has always been to have a thriving domestic fishing industry that provides our nation with, if not all, a majority of its seafood. Conservation is an important component of fisheries management, but socioeconomic impacts are equally important. Congressional intent has been overridden by bureaucratic agenda. Fisheries management has to put people and fishing communities at the forefront, not create socioeconomic harm by implementing fishery management plans that ironically do not sustain the fisheries and are in fact destroying the communities.

Brian Rothschild is the president and CEO of the New Bedford, Mass.-based Center for Sustainable Fisheries.