Contact: Scott Smullen or Gordon Helm        FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
                                             12/9/97

According to a National Academy of Science study released today in Washington, the methods currently used by the National Marine Fisheries Service to determine the health of U.S. fish stocks are the best available for fisheries management and to set harvest levels, but could benefit from improved data.

Fisheries service leaders support the findings of the two year study that suggests improvements to the science underlying the nation's management of important commercial fish species. The study analyzed methods and information used to determine the status of fish stocks. Officials praised the study as complete, fair and forward looking.

"We agree with the reviewers that our present methods are the best available to evaluate our fisheries and the stocks on which they depend," says National Marine Fisheries Service Director Rollie Schmitten. "We also agree that better assessment methods need to be developed that include better data, expanded use of fishery-dependent information, more precise methods, and consistently attracting good scientists to this work," he said.

The study was conducted by the National Research Council, part of the National Academy of Sciences. It was requested by NOAA in 1995 and has been conducted over the past two years.

"We are pleased that the reviewers emphasized the importance of support for developing not only better tools and information but also young scientists," says fisheries service senior scientist Dr. William Fox.

Fox noted the review's discussion of the critical role of consistent, long-term monitoring of stocks and data collection in fishery management. "Our reviewers recognized our efforts to improve biological information about fish stocks and the ecosystems they inhabit and does an excellent job of confirming the need for more investment to collect and analyze this information." In particular, Fox noted, the report agrees that periodic standardized surveys using NOAA research vessels or contract vessels calibrated to a study's specification are key to accurate assessments.

The Academy report cautioned that currently the data underlying stock assessments are inadequate for precautionary management of fisheries resources as required by the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act, and on this basis more conservative management will be necessary to ensure sustainability, fisheries service officials said.

The study also suggests some areas where fisheries scientists could improve procedures used to make assessments, and thereby make the assessments more precise. Fisheries service and Clinton Administration officials will continue to seek the funds necessary to improve data collection programs and for modern research vessels designed to meet the minimally acceptable survey standards adopted by the international scientific community.

The National Research Council used simulations to review the agency's stock assessment models by generating a time series of data for five hypothetical fish populations under assumed scenarios. These data were given to fisheries service scientists who were asked to conduct assessments using a particular assessment model without knowing key population characteristics. Agency and non-agency scientists then assessed the data in the same manner they use to assess a fish population. Their analyses became the basis for NRC comments about fisheries stock assessments methods.

Stock assessment models mathematically estimate the current status of a stock, the rate of removal due to fishing, and/or the abundance needed to sustain the stock in the future. The models use historical data from the fisheries, such as landing statistics, and data from independent research, such as from trawl surveys aboard fisheries research vessels.

The NRC started the review of the agency's stock assessment methodologies in January 1996, after being asked to do so by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration leadership in 1995. NOAA, part of the U.S. Department of Commerce, is the parent agency of the National Marine Fisheries Service. The fisheries service is the federal agency responsible for managing and sustaining 428 marine fish species found in 3.4 million square miles of U.S. waters.