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Kernel
10-12-2008, 10:59 PM
Forwarded with permission...

Good news despite the shannanigans from Mary Beth Tooley.

- Mike F.


----- Original Message -----
From: Peter Baker
To: choir@tidewise.com
Subject: [Choir] NEFMC


The New England Fishery Management Council met this week and made two major decisions about herring on Wednesday.

(1) To remove allocation from Amendment 4

(2) To include time/area closures to reduce bycatch of river herring in the sea herring fishery



Including allocation in Amendment 4 would have drastically slowed down it’s development and implementation, thus delaying the implementation of a catch and bycatch monitoring program, which is the intent of the Amendment. Taking allocation out of this Amendment was a good decision by the NEFMC. Mary beth Tooley made a motion under “other business” at the end of the day Thursday to re-insert allocation into Amendment 4, but the motion was ruled out of order by Chairman Pappalardo.



Including river herring “hot spots” or time/area closures is a necessary reaction to the growing body of science that shows that midwater trawlers have a significant bycatch of river herring. Conservative estimates show that midwater trawlers kill more than 2 million river herring annually. Again, this was a good decision by the NEFMC.



The NEFMC also affirmed their interest in receiving monitoring strawman proposals from stakeholders, such as the CHOIR Coalition and the Herring Alliance. This is a solid opportunity to help the NEFMC develop a comprehensive catch and bycatch monitoring program.



Thanks to everyone who worked hard to make this week a positive step forward in our efforts to reform herring management!



Peter Baker


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