NPFMC Newsletter 2/98

605 West 4th Avenue, Suite 306, Anchorage, Alaska 99501 - (907) 271-2809 - Fax (907) 271-2817

The February Council meeting saw mild weather in Anchorage and a relaxed atmosphere. The week began with a joint meeting between the Council and the Board of Fisheries. The Council took final action on a new Observer Program structure, reviewed preliminary analyses of the BSAI pollock inshore/offshore allocations, and initiated potential amendments to the license limitation program.

The Council’s next meeting will be at the Anchorage Hilton Hotel, beginning on Wednesday, April 22. Items tentatively on the agenda are shown in the three-meeting outlook towards the end of this newsletter. The meeting will be a long one, running at least through Sunday, April 26, or even into Monday. The Scientific and Statistical Committee and Advisory Panel will begin meeting on Monday, April 20.

The SSC elected Dr. Richard Marasco as Chair. He is the Director of Resource Ecology Fisheries Management at the Alaska Fisheries Science Center in Seattle and has been on the SSC since September 1979. Dr. Jack Tagart, a member of the SSC since December 1988, was reelected to his third term as Vice-Chair. Dr. Tagart is a Research Scientist for the Marine Resources Division in the Fish Management Program of the Department of Fish and Wildlife in Olympia, Washington.

The Council approved BSAI Plan Amendment 53 which would allocate shortraker/rougheye rockfish in the Aleutian Islands subarea between fixed gear and trawl fisheries. The TAC would be allocated 30% to non-trawl gear and 70% to trawl gear If approved, this action would be effective by July 1, 1998. Staff contact is Jane DiCosimo.

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Amendment 3 to the scallop fishery management plan was adopted by the Council back in December 1997. Amendment 3 will delegate to the State authority to manage all aspects of the scallop fishery in Federal waters off Alaska except limited access (moratorium, licenses, etc.). At the February meeting, the Alaska Board of Fisheries and the Alaska Department of Fish and Game indicated that they would formally accept management of the scallop fishery.

Amendment 4 has been proposed to establish a license limitation system for the scallop fishery to replace the Federal vessel moratorium, which is scheduled to expire in the year 2000. At its February meeting, the Council reviewed participation and other data from the scallop fishery and developed a problem statement and alternatives for analysis. These alternatives are as follows:

Alternative 1: Status quo. The scallop vessel moratorium would expire in 2000 [open access].

Alternative 2: Vessel owners who qualify for Federal moratorium permits would receive a license [18 licenses total].

Alternative 3: Vessel owners who qualify for State moratorium permits would receive a license [10 licenses total].

Alternative 4: Holders of either Federal or State moratorium permits that used their moratorium permits to make legal landings of scallops in 1996 or 1997 would receive a license. The federal or state moratorium qualification period would serve as the historic qualifying period andthe years 1996 and 1997 would serve as the recent qualifying period.

Note that participation in 1998 will not be considered for qualifying under these alternatives. Analysis of license limitation for the scallop fishery will be ready for initial review in October, with final action scheduled for February 1999. The Council will work closely with the Alaska Board of Fisheries commencing with the meeting of the joint Board/Council Committee in July, in developing a system that is acceptable to both management bodies. Staff contact is Dave Witherell.

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The Magnuson-Stevens Act amendments emphasized the importance of habitat protection to healthy fisheries and strengthening the ability of NMFS and the Councils to protect and conserve habitat of finfish, mollusks, and crustaceans. This habitat is termed essential fish habitat (EFH), and is broadly defined to include “those waters and substrate necessary to fish for spawning, breeding, feeding, or growth to maturity.” The Councils are required to amend their fishery management plans by October 1998 to:

Once the FMPs are amended with this EFH information, NMFS and the Councils can be more proactive in protecting habitat areas by alerting other federal and state agencies about areas of concern. Federal agenciesengaging in activities that may adversely affect EFH must consult with NMFS regarding those activities. NMFS and the Council may make suggestions on how to mitigate any potential habitat damage.

Over the past year, Council staff has worked closely with NMFS and the Alaska Department of Fish and Game to prepare preliminary EFH reports for groundfish, crab, salmon, and scallops, which were released for public review in December. These reports will form the basis of preliminary NMFS EFH recommendations in April, when the Council is scheduled to initially review the analysis. Final approval of the EFH amendments is scheduled for June 1998.

Although EFH can only be defined for target species defined in FMPs (a NOAA GC opinion based on the Magnuson-Stevens Act and EFH guidelines), habitat information for prohibited species (such as herring, halibut, GOA crab) will be included as an appendix in the final groundfish plan amendment package. The Council recommended that NOAA GC review their opinion on EFH species designation, as there was concern about not designating EFH for prohibited species.

At this time, one management measure is proposed to address the impacts of fishing gear on habitat. A 4-mile by 4-mile pinnacle area off Sitka has been proposed as a no fishing area to protect habitat important for juvenile rockfish and lingcod. Staff contact is Dave Witherell.

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In this past summer’s annual call for proposals, we emphasized the need for additional bycatch management measures to comply with the provisions of the Magnuson-Stevens Act. At the September meeting, the Council initiated development of several of the proposals received. These include:

The Council reviewed a discussion paper prepared by staff detailing proposed alternatives to be examined, an analytical time line, and an overview of questions and issues relating to each proposal. The Council added an additional alternative for analysis of the chinook salmon bycatch proposal. This alternative would prohibit trawling on a year-round basis in an area(s) with historically high bycatch rates of chinook salmon.

The first two of the above few potential amendments will be developed for review by the Council in April 1998. The remaining proposals would be developed over a longer time period, given their complexity. The Council will establish a committee to further develop the halibut mortality avoidance program and the individual checklist program. Staff contact is Dave Witherell.

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The Council approved Plan Amendments 52/52 which contained two separate actions to address at-risk fisheries in the Western and Central Gulf. The Council directed NMFS to develop a vessel registration program for “at risk” fisheries which meet certain criteria. NMFS will report back to the Council at a later meeting. The Council also approved a stand-down requirement, as described below, for vessels transiting between the BSAI and GOA. If approved, implementation of the stand-down would be planned for the pollock B season in September 1998. The vessel registration would take additional time for development and would be implemented at a later date.

The Council also expanded the charter of the previous GOA Trip Limit Committee to a Western/Central Gulf Committee to develop a range of options on management of at-risk fisheries through trip limits, vessel allocations, exclusive registration, staggered openings, subarea reserves, and possibly IFQs. The committee will also address observer and enforcement issues and the efficacy of the recently approved stand-down and vessel registration programs, once implemented. A revised membership will be appointed by the Council Chairman in the near future. Staff contact is Jane DiCosimo.

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The Council approved a regulatory amendment to revise the Western and Central GOA pollock trimester apportionments to address the large increase in the 1998 GOA pollock ABC and TAC due to an above-average 1994 pollock year class. Concern expressed by scientists, industry, and the public over pollock availability for endangered Steller sea lions in the GOA led to this action. The trimester apportionment revision would redistribute the pollock TACs so that increases in projected pollock removals during the second season would occur during a potentially less stressful foraging period for sea lions. The benefit to sea lions comes as both potential increase in available forage and shorter fishing duration in the third quarter. The Council reapportioned 10 percent of the pollock TAC in the W/C Regulatory Areas from the third season (September 1) to the second season (June 1) resulting in a 25/35/40 split. The Council did not approve an associated plan amendment that would framework a process whereby the percentage of pollock TAC apportioned to each season would be specified during the annual harvest specification process. Also, the Marine Mammal Lab scientists will continue to investigate the relationship between fishing effort and the Steller sea lion population decline. Staff contact is Jane DiCosimo.

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The Council approved the Sitka Sound local area halibut management plan. The plan was a cooperative management effort between the Council and the Alaska Board of Fisheries, its local fish and game advisory committee and Halibut Task Force. This plan would create a local area management plan for Sitka Sound with the following provisions. The boundaries are depicted in the map below and will be specified by latitude and longitude in the regulations.

Additionally, the Council and Board adopted a protocol (Attachment #1 ) for the development of future local area management plans for groundfish and halibut. All community-based local area management plan proposals should be submitted during the Board’s call for proposals. When the proposal is found to meet all the requirements stated in the call for proposals and the protocol, the halibut portion of the proposal will be forwarded to the Council for review and action. Staff contacts are Jane DiCosimo (Council) and Doug Vincent-Lang (ADF&G-Anchorage at (907) 267-2339).

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The Council received a staff presentation on the status of the Inshore/Offshore 3 (I/O 3) analysis. A copy of the document that was presented may be requested from the Council office, noting that information from that document will be included in the overall analysis scheduled for initial review in April. A final decision is still on track for the June meeting in Dutch Harbor. The primary goal at this meeting was to provide an opportunity for the Council, and the fishing industry, to review the information compiled to date and provide any feedback to the analysts on the data and assumptions to be used in the analysis. Staff had hoped to present all of the baseline information that will be used in the analysis at this meeting. However, they have been unable to obtain employment and price data for the offshore fleet which would be comparable to that which exists for the onshore sector.

To address this situation, the At-sea Processors Association (APA) has volunteered to help supply price and employment data. Because the data will be obtained in a manner that is outside of normal methods, the Council has appointed a small Committee to develop Agreed-Upon-Procedures (an accounting terminology) which will then be used by an independent accounting firm (to be selected by the Council) in their review of the information submitted. The Agreed-Upon-Procedures will outline the types of data that will be collectedand the verification process that will be employed by the CPA firm checking the data. The purpose of defining those procedures is to provide members of the analytical team and industry a greater comfort level with the data submitted. Data which is derived through this process will be clearly identified in the analysis.

At this time, APA has already began compiling such information. While we do not wish to exclude participation by other industry sectors, or other at-sea companies not affiliated with APA, we do wish to point out two important considerations: (1) the information being submitted is to specifically fill existing gaps in our analytical information on at-sea employment and at-sea fish prices; and, (2) the timeline for incorporating this information is very short (less than one month). If other companies wish to supply this type of information, they would be required to conform to the Agreed-Upon-Procedures, and hire an accounting firm of the Council’s choosing (at their expense), all within the one month time frame.

The Council also developed a list of changes and additions to the analysis being prepared, based on recommendations from the AP and SSC. These are detailed in the AP minutes and are not listed here. To the extent possible, those changes will be incorporated in the initial review draft of the analysis.

During their upcoming meeting in April, the Council is scheduled to undertake an initial review of the entire I/O 3 package, including the Council staff analysis and related studies being conducted by the State of Alaska (relative to the CDQ program impacts) and Impact Assessment, Inc. (contracted by the Council for social/community impact analysis). If the Council determines that the document is adequate, it will be released to the public for comment so a final decision can be made at the June meeting in Dutch Harbor. This tight time line is necessary so that the Council’s I/O 3 program can be in place when the current allocation expires on December 31, 1998.

The Council also passed a motion to begin a Fishery Management Plan (FMP) amendment that would require industry to report price and cost data. This effort will be coordinated with other related data collection efforts of the Alaska Fisheries Science Center and Pacific States Marine Fisheries Commission. Council staff contacts for this issue are Chris Oliver and Darrell Brannan.

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The Council received a staff report on proposed amendments to the license limitation program (LLP) which were raised by the Council or its Advisory Panel (AP) at the December 1997 meeting. While the Council did not proceed with consideration of recent participation requirements for the groundfish fisheries, they did proceed with development of an amendment package which includes recent participation requirements for the BSAI crab fisheries. Gear crossover restrictions are also being considered. While the LLP program has been approved by the Secretary of Commerce, it is not expected to be implemented until January 2000; therefore, the Council also initiated an extension of the vessel moratorium currently in place. These and other proposed amendments are summarized below:

1. Prevent transfer of permits from vessels that never held a federal fishery permit during the LLP qualifying period and prohibit transfers of fishing histories and subsequent licenses as of February 7, 1998, (applies to all vessels).

2. Prohibit licenses and fishing histories earned by vessels employing non-trawl gear to be used on vessels employing trawl gear and licenses and fishing histories earned by vessels employing trawl gear to be used on non-trawl gear vessels (i.e., if a vessel never used trawl gear during the original qualification periods, that license could not be converted for using trawl gear, and vice-versa).

a. Grandfather rights only to persons who can demonstrate significant financial commitment to apply a non-trawl license or fishing history to a trawl operation (and the reverse) as of February 7, 1998, with the following suboptions:

3. Rescind the CDQ vessel exemption portion of the LLP, with grandfather rights to any vessels currently built or operating in an existing CDP under this provision.

4. Clarify that catch history transfers would be recognized, except those occurring after June 17, 1995, and where the owner of the vessel at that time was unable to document a vessel under Chapter 121, Title 46, U.S. Code.

Initiate an amendment (possibly a trailing amendment) to the Crab LLP to include a recent participation clause, with the following options:

• The recent participation requirement would apply to the general umbrella license only (i.e., if a vessel satisfies the recent participation criteria chosen, it would receive its original umbrella license and species/area endorsements under that umbrella — new species/area endorsements could not be ‘earned’ during the new qualification period).

• The amendment/regulations should be structured such that interim permits could be issued for the Crab LLP if these changes cannot be fully implemented when the LLP program takes effect, and structured such that permanent permits could then be issued without additional amendments to the plan.

• Council serves notice that the above dates for meeting performance standards are very firm. The Council may examine more recent participation than February 7, 1998, in making its final decision (such as date of final Council action), but cannot now foresee any extraordinary circumstances that would allow the cut-off dates to be advanced past those shown above.

The Council’s intent is that these proposed amendments be analyzed and brought back to the Council for initial review at the June meeting (Dutch Harbor) if possible. It is likely that some of these, if approved, can be in place in time for the year 2000 target implementation date. Others may be developed as ‘trailing’amendments and would come in place as soon as possible, if approved. Again, the current schedule is for initial review in June with a final decision scheduled for the October meeting in Seattle.

It is still anticipated that the new BSAI crab CDQ program would be implemented by mid-year, and the multi-species groundfish CDQ program in late 1998. Staff contact for these issues is Chris Oliver.

The Council approved sending Amendments 48/48 out for public review. Their objective is to streamline the current groundfish quota specification process. First, publication of proposed and interim specifications in the Federal Register would be eliminated. Final specifications are effective unless modified, superseded, or rescinded. Allowable Biological Catches (ABCs) and Total Allowable Catches (TACs) would remain unchanged from year to year until revised in a subsequent final rule. Second, obsolete references to foreign and joint venture fishery management measures would be omitted from the FMPs. Third, NMFS in-season management authority would be revised to allow for continued flexibility in adjusting TACs. As a result, the annual specifications would become more succinct and easier to understand. The public review draft will be available in early March.

The Council also approved a list of research priorities to forward to NMFS for use in preparing its annual budget. Staff contact is Jane DiCosimo.

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The Council approved the third-party, joint partnership agreement (JPA) observer program structure, whereby the Pacific States Marine Fisheries Commission (PSMFC) would become the source for procuring all observers, beginning in 1999. The existing program, with industry obtaining observers directly from the contracting companies, will continue through 1998. Remaining details of the JPA program will be worked out by NMFS and PSMFC with input from the Council’s Observer Advisory Committee (OAC), which will likely meet sometime in March and provide a progress report at the April Council meeting in Anchorage. Staff is also tasked with re-developing a fee system to fund the observer program. This will occur over the next two years, also with the assistance of the Council’s OAC. Staff contact is Chris Oliver.

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New requirements in the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act require the North Pacific Council to ensure total catch measurement of target species, economic discards, and regulatory discards, and to submit requirements for weighing of fish, if deemed necessary. To that end, the Council’s Scientific and Statistical Committee held a day-long workshop on February 2 to review catch estimation procedures. They remarked that, in many respects, the system in place is better than any found around the world, but nevertheless, improvements in all aspects of data collection are crucial to successful fisheries management in the future. The SSC offered several suggestions on improving catch estimation and noted that they plan to review catch estimation each February.

The Council heard several reports on catch estimation experiments and called for a review of NMFS’ ability to accurately measure catch of each species. These will be available by the October 1998 Council meeting and the Council then will determine where to place its efforts in improving catch measurement. The Council did pass a motion to initiate analysis of a plan amendment to require certified bins or scales for catchestimation in the Bering Sea and Aleutian pollock and yellowfin sole fisheries. NMFS will report back in April on the scope of the proposed analysis, and on what steps it will be taking over this next year to improve its catch estimation procedures. NMFS will also be reviewing assumptions that underlay catch estimation, such as the density coefficients for pollock. This information will help the Council to determine what types of new measures to submit in order to comply with the new requirements in the Magnuson-Stevens Act.

The Council also decided to keep the regulations on the books that now require a groundfish fisherman to retain salmon bycatch until counted by an observer. The Council had been requested by NMFS to rescind that regulation because NMFS uses “blend” data to estimate salmon bycatch rather than the counts of retained salmon. At the request of the Board of Fisheries, and because the Council, its SSC, and NMFS, will be reviewing catch estimation procedures over the coming year, the Council decided to leave the regulation on the books for the time being. Staff contact is David Witherell.

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In February 1997, the Council appointed an industry committee to further develop a ‘strawman’ vessel bycatch accountability (VBA) program for consideration. A VBA program is essentially an individual bycatch program. Such a program would address the prohibited species (PSC) bycatch problem by decreasing the bycatch of PSC, increasing the ability of the fleet to harvest groundfish without exceeding PSC limits, and producing more equitable distribution of bycatch costs.

The committee has met several times to flesh out details and options for a VBA program. At the February 1998 meeting, committee chairman Steve Hughes reported back to the Council with a preliminary list of alternatives, elements, and options, as well as a discussion of the monitoring, enforcement, and legal considerations. The Council recommended that the committee continue its efforts, and report back with a final list of alternatives and options, along with a discussion of monitoring issues. Summaries of the proceedings from recent VBA Committee meetings are available from the Council office. A VBA committee meeting has tentatively been scheduled for late May. Staff contact is Dave Witherell.

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With the IR/IU program on-line this year, several implementation issues have been raised and the Council will be reactivating the IR/IU Implementation Committee chaired by Council member, Joe Kyle. This committee will likely be meeting in March with a slightly revised membership to be announced soon. One specific issue that the Council took action on at this meeting was the sand flea problem in the longline cod fisheries. The Council heard from industry regarding the requirement to retain all fish, even those infested with sand fleas or other parasites, and risking contamination of the remaining fish on board. The Council passed a motion to initiate, if necessary, a regulatory amendment to the program to allow the discard of these fish. NMFS will first explore other, non-regulatory solutions to this problem prior to developing a formal amendment. Staff contact is Jane DiCosimo.

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NMFS has announced a public workshop to examine the question of whether or not the Atka mackerel fishery results in significant localized depletion of the stock, whether such depletions might have an effect on the foraging success of Steller sea lions, and what management options we should consider to mitigate those potential effects.

Date/Time:	Tuesday, March 10, 1998, beginning at 9:00 a.m.
Location:	Alaska Fisheries Science Center 7600 Sand Point Way NE, Building 4 Room 2143 Seattle, Washington
Background:	Fishing for Atka mackerel in the Bering Sea/Aleutian Island region may result in localized depletions of mackerel stocks. Atka mackerel is a prey species of the endangered western population of Steller sea lions, and such depletions may impede sea lion recovery if they affect the foraging success of young sea lions, in particular.
Purpose:	The National Marine Fisheries Service will conduct a public workshop to (1) consider the nature and extent of such potential localized depletions, and (2) identify and consider management options for their prevention.
Participants:	The meeting will be open to the public, and all interested persons are encouraged to attend.
Contact:	For further information, contact Tim Ragen (907) 5867248 or 7235, E-mail: Tim.Ragen @noaa.gov.