Fishing Monitors to Accompany Fewer New England Trips
SEAFOODNEWS.COM [Boston Globe] By David Abel - May 2, 2016
After protesting for months about having to pay for the government observers who monitor their catch, the region’s fishermen are catching a break.
The National Marine Fisheries Service on Friday approved a measure that will ease the financial burden on fishermen by reducing the number of times observers must accompany them to sea.
They will now have to take monitors on only 14 percent of their fishing trips, down from nearly a quarter of all trips.
The decision has raised concerns among environmental advocates, who argue that the government should be doing more to monitor the catch of vulnerable species such as Atlantic cod.
“With the experience and data from five years of monitoring, we have determined that the lower coverage levels in this rule will allow us to effectively estimate discards,” said Jennifer Goebel, a spokeswoman for the Fisheries Service in Gloucester.
Fishermen are required to bring in all the fish they catch...
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