OCEAN FISHERIES PROTECTIONS TO BE WEAKENED

[nosmokes]

Yet another example of the fox guarding that henhouse. Why not? I don't thiink thre's any layers left in there nyhow at this point.
--###--

original-peer

For Immediate Release: August 7, 2008
Contact: Carol Goldberg [phone]


OCEAN FISHERIES PROTECTIONS TO BE WEAKENED

— Bush Plan Would Give Industry Greater Power over Fishery Management Decisions

Boston — Under the guise of updating procedures, the Bush administration is pushing changes which could dramatically weaken protections against overfishing already depleted ocean stocks, according to public comments filed today by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER). The thrust of the Bush plan would cede more control to the fishing industry over environmental harvest limits.

The deadline for public comment on the Bush-sponsored revisions ends August 12, 2008. Today, a coalition of conservation groups delivered thousands of protest letters to regional offices of the National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) whose National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) is charged with conserving ocean fish populations. In Boston, comments were loaded onto a boat in Boston Harbor for delivery to the Gloucester offices of NMFS.

Although Congress mandated updating of environmental review procedures for marine fisheries management, that update was supposed to encourage ecosystem management of ocean resources and strengthen rather than sap safeguards against over-fishing. Nearly a year past the congressionally mandated due date, the Bush administration unveiled a plan that –

* Puts the fishing industry, rather than NOAA, in charge of framing assessments of the effects of management policies, including deciding the scope, timing and standard of evaluation for environmental reviews. This change, in essence, privatizes management of ocean fisheries;
* Expands loopholes for avoiding any environmental reviews on a host of fishery actions; and
* Cuts the ability of outside researchers, conservation groups and the public to review and comment on fishery management decisions.

“This is a lame duck gift to the fishing industry,” stated New England PEER Director Kyla Bennett, a former federal biologist. “This plan represents a U-turn away from public interest regulation of marine resources most imperiled by commercial over-exploitation.”

The schedule for this plan will likely have it finalized in late October, just before the self-imposed November 1st moratorium by the Bush administration for adopting new rules and in a timeframe that will hamper any congressional review until 2009, at the earliest.

In a similar vein the Bush administration is also privatizing the monitoring of commercial fishing vessels to ensure compliance with catch limits, by-catch rules and regulations protecting marine mammals, sea turtles, seabirds and other non-commercial sea life. There are growing calls in Congress to remove NOAA from the industry-friendly Commerce Department and create a strong national oceans policy.

“Only the Bush administration would champion privatizing the oceans,” Bennett added. “The declining state of our seas calls for bold national leadership and international cooperation rather than the abdication of responsibilities reflected here.”


###
.
.
.
complete release including links to related sources here

[grasswire]

1. a boondoggle for Sun Myung Moon

Moon's Unification Church network controls much of the world's fisheries and this is probably a payoff for Moon from his close pals, the Bushes.

Looters. Grifters. Ghouls.

[eppur_se_muova]

2. License to loot and pillage -- i.e., the usual from Bu**sh** maladministration. nt

[freethought]

3. This band of theives (Bushco)

Is going to push the envelope when it comes to do doing the most damage in the least amount of time. These people are scum.

[kwolf68]

4. The last few months are going to be horrid

This ingrate pResident is going to do as much damage as he possible can at the behest of industry in the time he has left...Dimson will be anything but a lame duck, environmental issues will take a huge blow. This is where the Dems need to buck up against this tyrant.

[cliffordu]

5. The upside is that the sooner we kill the oceans the sooner we can de-list the

whole ecosystem as being threatened, and then we can claim another success in the war on the environment -

I mean the effort to save the environment.

[mrs_p]

6. i am so sick of this crap

how can this be happening?? fishing industry IN CHARGE of their own regs? oh please!

[freethought]

8. They already are to a certain point.

This just makes it totally unaccountable to the public. Atypical neocon thinking, free markets and privatization are ranked up there with Jesus and the Virgin Mary, while the public interest ranks somewhere between maggots and roaches.

National Marine Fisheries Service does the research to evaluate the health of fisheries, THEY DON"T SET REGULATION. If memory serves me correctly actual regulatory decisions are made by these regional fishery councils which are usually chaired by industry insiders. NMFS simply makes recommendations based on the science. However things such as meeting and information were usually open to public comment or scrutiny. This looks like it does away with any public input at all. Private profits reign supreme.

I'm not a commercial fisherman, however one of my personal passions is saltwater sport angling. And the health of certain fish populations depends heavily on the level of exploitation of other species. For example, one of my favorites is the Striped Bass, considered the reigning king of SW game fish up here in the Northeast. However, stripers depend heavily on menhaden as forage, but menhaden are being heavily fished to provide material for chicken feed and other products. There are sportsman's clubs and organizations trying to put some controls on the harvest but they do not have the money to hire lobbyists.

It is the classic story of the fox guarding the hen house.

[hatrack]

7. Shocked, shocked!

Not.