SeaNotes - Monterey Bay Aquarium's blog

November 25, 2008

The Dutch Harbor Fisherman
by George Pletnikoff
September 19, 2008


When fishing gear - be it nets larger than football fields dragging the
ocean's floor, crab pots, longline fishing hooks or other gear - used to
catch and kill fish, much more than fish are being destroyed.

Let's look at one of them - the deep-sea trawlers that hunt and search
for pollock and other flat fishes.

Andrew Trites is the director of the marine mammal unit at the
UBC-Fisheries Centre and the research director of the North Pacific
Universities Marine Mammal Research Consortium. In 1992, Trites
published an article "Northern Fur Seals: Why Have They Declined?" in
the Aquatic Mammals Journal.

The article discusses how the first major commercial groundfish fishery
in the Gulf of Alaska targeted Pacific Ocean perch. The size of the
catch rose quickly through the early 1960s until the resource was
depleted. The fishery then began targeting pollock.

As it had happened with perch, the catch of pollock rose gradually
through 1980 when a large spawning aggregation was discovered in the
waters off of Kodiak Island. Over the next five years the spawning
aggregation was heavily exploited and the fishery peaked and collapsed.

Trites states that the same picture can be painted for fisheries in the
Bering Sea. Yellowfin sole catches rose from 1954 to 1961 until the
stock declined due to overfishing. As the yellowfin sole declined, the
fishery moved to pollock.

Now we know that the pollock fishery in the Kodiak waters, the Bogoslov
Island waters and the Aleutian Islands have either been shut down due to
overfishing or their catchable amounts severely cut because of
overfishing. So what's new? Outside multinational fishing companies see
an opportunity to exploit beyond reason, come into our waters and
destroy. Sounds like a familiar tune when discussing other resources in
our great state. Oil and gas, minerals, forests, salmon populations and
sadly, people.

It's beginning to sound like a problem that needs some serious attention
from our state and federal governments. After all, our governments lay
claim to represent all the people of both our state and nation.

Oh yes, we do have such oversight boards and councils. The National
Marine Fisheries Service and the Alaska Board of Fish are legally
charged with that responsibility.

And to help in these processes, advisory councils are put in place to
help give direction. The fisheries service has the North Pacific Fishery
Management Council and the Board of Fish has regional advisory councils.
But guess what? The North Pacific Council and the Board of Fish are
stocked, not with fish, but with commercial fishing representatives and
interests to make these decisions. And these councils and boards are
ripe for the plucking.

Industry lobbyists and lawyers might often wine and dine these
"representatives of the people's resource" to get their quotas, no
matter the science. And they might often get their way. Take a quick
look at the North Pacific Council's Web site and see who the council
members are and whom they work for.

"Drill, baby, drill" is not a new cry for resource development at any
cost. In the 1980s and 1990s and up to this day it has been "fish, baby,
fish," before there are no more fish to catch. With the problems of
climate change, other species' populations crashing and people being
dislocated, it is time to reappoint "representative" people to these
councils and boards.

Industry greed and ways of doing business have got to stop. There is a
lot of talk these days about reform. If ever an industry needed reform,
this is it.

Just last year, the North Pacific Council cut the total amount of
pollock catch a whopping 24 percent from the year before! If that same
amount of decline were done to, say, the oil and gas industries, you
would hear a loud cry from the public.

We need to pay close attention to the reasons for this kind of
management of our resources. One of the reasons given for the drastic
cut the pollock fishery took was lack of recruitment. Oh, yes. I forgot
to tell you that twice a year, millions of pounds of pollock roe, the
caviar of the Bering Sea, is auctioned off to a hand full of "by
invitation only" companies.

"Fish, baby, fish."

This is the people's resource put into the trusting hands of appointed
councils. We must hold them accountable. They work for us, not the
industry.

George Pletnikoff is originally from St. George Island and works as the
Alaska Oceans Campaigner for Greenpeace in Anchorage. His e-mail address
is: george.pletnikoff@wdc.greenpeace.org

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