5.2 Marine Fisheries off Alaska

BY KEITH R. CRIDDLE, DIANA EVANS, AND DIANA STRAM

F isheries in the nearly 900,OOO-square-mile Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) off Alaska (Fig. 5.2.1) yield more than half of all US landings of fish and shellfish and about $1.7 billion in

exvessel revenues to commercial fishers. The consequences of climate change to these fisheries will depend on the resilience of the ecological system, resilience of the resource governance regime, and resilience of the resource-dependent social and economic systems. This chapter provides an introduction to the governance and management of marine fisheries off Alaska and an introduction to the princi­pal fisheries and the current status of fished stocks. This information is essential to understanding how these fisheries will be affected by climate change in the coming decades. While the examples provided below are specific to Alaska, similar issues can be expected to arise across the circumpolar north.

Fisheries Governance

As fishing power increased in the wake of World War II, coastal nations became increasingly concerned about the effects of unchecked fishing in waters imme­diately outside their 12-mile territorial seas. Diplomatic conflicts in The Hague spilled over into armed confrontations off Iceland, Ecuador, and Peru as coastal nations asserted authority over access to fishery resources in the high seas adjacent to their territorial waters. By the mid-1970s, there was general global consensus that coastal nations could exercise control over commercially valuable fishery and mineral resources within an EEZ that extended from their shore outward for 200 miles. Where there was overlap, the EEZ boundaries were to be settled in bilateral or multilateral negotiations. These terms were formalized in the Law of the Sea treaty, along with a provision that entitles signatories to assert claims to mineral

305

306 NORTH BY 2020: PERSPECTIVES ON ALASKA'S CHANGING SOCIAL-ECOLOGICAL SYSTEMS

resources beyond the 200-mile limit when such resources are located on continu­ations of the continental mass of the claimant. The EEZs of the United States, Canada, Greenland, Norway, and Russia cover all but the central-most portions of the Arctic Ocean. While large-scale commercial fisheries have not yet emerged in the western Arctic, there are growing fisheries in the eastern Arctic; pressure to expand these fisheries will increase as the Arctic becomes increasingly ice-free and as fisheries in other regions are further depleted. Interest in mineral and petroleum resources has already led some nations to assert seabed claims that extend beyond their EEZs.

Federal and state authority over fisheries is set forth in the state and federal constitutions, laws passed by US Congress and by the Alaska Legislature, regula­tions issued by federal and state agencies, common law precedents, and treaties with sovereign nations and dependent sovereign entities. In general, the state of Alaska has jurisdiction over commercial, sport, and subsistence fisheries in lakes, streams, and rivers within state boundaries. It also has jurisdiction over fisher­ies in marine waters within 3 miles of the shoreline. Federal jurisdiction includes fisheries in lakes, streams, and rivers encompassed by federal lands within state borders and all fisheries that occur in marine waters from 3 to 200 miles offshore. International treaties affect the management and conduct of halibut and salmon fisheries ofF Alaska.

Common Law

Common law underpins ownership of property, the creation and enforcement of contracts, and settlement of nuisances and torts. Property law is the governing basis for determining who is entitled to access fish and other living marine resources and whether that access is open to all, managed as a common pool, or subject to a system of license limitation, spatial use rights, cooperatives, or individual quotas. Based on legal precedents in the United States, navigable waterways and fish that reside in them are public trust resources. Transfer of ownership of such resources to private persons is only permissible when doing so benefits the public interest (National Research Council [NRC] 1999; Simmons 2007). Consequently, although indi­viduals or groups can be granted license to harvest fish and other living marine resources, government typically retains a trust responsibility for safeguarding the sustainability of those resources (McCay 1998).

Federal Constitutional Law

Although the US Constitution does not directly reference fisheries, it does deter­mine the relationship between federal and state authority and the rights of indi­viduals. Bader (1998) suggests that the property clause (Art. 4, Sec. 3) provides a

lVlanagemcnt of Living lV1arine Resources 307

basis for federal authority over fishery resources associated with federal lands and in the EEZ even if those resources stray onto state or private lands. Because the commerce clause (Art. 1, Sec. 8) assigns exclusive authority over interstate com­merce, movement of fish across state boundaries or into or out of federal waters is subject to federal oversight (Bader 1998). The treaty clause (Art. 2, Sec. 2) provides the federal government with authority to override state and local interests in favor of agreements with sovereign nations or dependent sovereign entities.

States' authority over fish resources derives from the federal Constitution. Principally, it is the authority to exercise police powers that allows each state to fulfill its responsibilities for management of public trust resources. States can join together in interstate compacts to jointly manage shared fishery resources. The regional Fishery Management Councils established under the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act of 1976 can be regarded as a collec­tion of interstate compacts mandated and moderated by the federal government (Bader 1998).

The constitutional authority of tribes rests in their status as dependent sover­eign entities with authority to regulate nonmember access to resources on tribal lands. While there are no recognized tribal claims in the Bering, Chukchi, or Beaufort Seas, court decisions are increasingly supportive of recognizing a tribal character to Native claims in Alaska, and tribal claims may come to be recognized in these waters.

The US Constitution also conveys individual rights that relate to fisheries man­agement. For example, states are prohibited from discriminating against citizens of other states. While nonresidents may be charged higher fees for access to resources, any fee differential must be founded on real differences in the cost of management or in the burden of funding for management. The takings clause protects private ownership interests once those interests have been established. For example, own­ership can be established through capture; landing fish aboard a vessel or ashore renders them a possession of the captor.

Federal Statutes and Regulations

Statutes passed by the legislative branch are transformed into regulations byexecu­tive branch agencies. The most important federal statute for US fisheries man­agement is the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act, which established US authority for management of fishery resources in the EEZ and delegated that authority to the secretary of commerce. It also created a sys­tem of regional Fishery Management Councils that are responsible for preparing Fishery Management Plans (FMPs) for living marine resources subject to fish­ing. Under the 2006 reauthorization of the Magnuson-Stevens Act, the Fishery

308 NORTH BY 2020: PERSPECTIVES ON ALASKA'S CHANGING SOCIAL-ECOLOGICAL SYSTEMS

Management Councils are constrained to set total allowable catch limits that are at or below the allowable biological catch limits established by their Scientific and Statistical Committees. This has been the standard operating procedure in the North Pacific Fishery Management Council, which is responsible for fisheries off Alaska, and has been identified as an important factor in the successful manage­ment of these fisheries (Pew Oceans Commission 2003; Witherell 2005).

Section 301 of the Magnuson-Stevens Act specifies ten national standards to be used to judge the admissibility of proposed conservation and management mea­sures. FMPs are required to (1) prevent overfishing while achieving, on a continu­ing basis, the optimum yield from each fishery; (2) be based on the best scientific information available; (3) manage stocks of fish as a unit throughout their range; (4) avoid discrimination between residents of different states and ensure that any allocation or assignment of fishing privileges be fair and equitable, calculated to promote conservation, and carried out in such a manner that no particular entity acquires an excessive share of such privileges; (5) consider efficiency in the utiliza­tion of fishery resources; (6) take into account and allow for variations among, and contingencies in, fisheries, fishery resources, and catches; (7) minimize costs and avoid unnecessary regulatory duplication; (8) minimize adverse economic impacts on fishing communities; (9) minimize bycatch and bycatch mortality; and (10) promote the safety of human life at sea.

Fisheries management is also strongly affected by three other federal statutes. The National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 requires evaluation of possible environmental consequences of proposed actions to inform decision-making pro­cesses including the establishment or amendment of FMPs and setting annual catch limits. The Endangered Species Act of 1966 requires the conservation of species listed as threatened or endangered. Compliance with the ESA requires determining if proposed FMP amendments or annual catch limits could adversely affect listed species or adversely modifY their critical habitat. The Marine Mammal Protection Act of 1972 requires that proposed FMP amendments be examined to identifY any adverse impacts to populations of marine mammals.

Alaska State Law and Regulation

The Alaska Constitution contains three sections that explicitly address fisheries: Article VIII, Section 3 reaffirms the public trust status of fishery resources (Bader 1998; Macinko 1993); Article VIII, Section 4 directs that fish resources be man­aged to achieve sustainable yields; and Article VIII, Section 15 restricts the author­ity of state agencies to grant exclusive harvest rights. These sections set a minimum on the number of permits that can be included in limited entry fisheries and pro­hibit the issuance of individual fishing quotas in state fisheries.

.Management ofLi1Jing A1arine ResouruJ 309

Federal Fishery Management

The North Pacific Fishery Management Council has implemented six regional FMPs for Alaska fisheries: the Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands and Gulf of Alaska groundfish FMPSj the Arctic Management Area FMPj the Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands crab FMPj the scallop FMPj and the salmon FMP Understanding the scope of these FMPs and their limitations is crucial to understanding how they contribute to or detract from the resilience of marine fishery-based social­ecological systems. The six FMPs and their associated amendments govern annual catch limits; restrict various fishing practices relating to gear, bycatch and discard requirements, and allocation of fishery privileges among fishersj and constrain spatial and temporal access to fishery resources. Substantial areas of the EEZ off Alaska have been closed to all fishing, or closed to groundfish fishing with trawl gear, to mitigate adverse interactions between fishing vessels and marine mammals, to protect sensitive habitat for fish or marine mammal species, or to control bycatch of non-target species. In addition, the North Pacific Fishery Management Council develops allocative management measures for the halibut fishery off Alaska, which is managed under the terms of a treaty with Canada.

Development of the FMPs and subsequent amendments are subject to an extensive public process, set up under the Magnuson-Stevens Act. Each proposed FMP or amendment is analyzed by staff to determine the impacts of the proposed action or alternative actions that may accomplish the same purpose. Staff analyses are reviewed by the Scientific and Statistical Committee, a stakeholder Advisory Panel, and the North Pacific Fishery Management Council during at least one, and usually several, public meetings at which written and oral testimony is solicited from the public. Additionally, for major actions, the council often sets up commit­tees of interested stakeholders to provide additional advice.

The FMPs have evolved differently with respect to the deference accorded fed­eral and state fishery managers. Federal fishery managers have a predominant role in the case of those fisheries that were undeveloped or largely prosecuted by foreign vessels at the time the Magnuson-Stevens Act was adopted; state fishery managers take the lead for most fisheries that have enjoyed a long history of US participation.

Federal Management

The Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands and Gulf of Alaska groundfish FMPs and the Arctic Management Area FMP are all exclusively under federal management. Up until the early 1980s, the groundfish fisheries off Alaska were largely prosecuted by foreign vessels. With the advent of the Magnuson-Stevens Act, which encouraged domestication of fisheries within the US EEZ, a domestic groundfish fishery was

310 NORTH BY 2020: PERSPECTIVES ON ALASKA'S CHANGING SOCIAL-ECOLOGICAL SYSTEMS

gradually established, working first in joint ventures with the foreign processing vessels. Since the early 1990s, the groundfish fisheries have been entirely pursued by US vessels. This change in economic organization and the distribution of eco­nomic benefits has been the result of conscious choices reflected in amendments to the FMPs. In turn, it has necessitated amendments to the FMPs to address unexpected consequences of the Americanization of the fisheries.

The Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands groundfish FMP was implemented in 1982 and has been amended more than eighty times to address evolving biologi­cal, management, and social issues. The BSAI FMP covers fisheries for all stocks of finfish except salmonids, halibut, herring, and invertebrates. It sets an overall optimum yield cap of 2 million metric tons for the aggregate total allowable catch for all FMP species in the Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands region.

The BSAI FMP management area includes the US EEZ lying south of a straight line from Cape Prince of Wales to Cape Dezhnev, Russia (68°21'N), east of the US-USSR convention line of 1988,1 and extending south of the Aleutian Islands for 200 miles between the convention line and Scotch Cap Light (164°44'36"W). The eastern boundary is 3 miles offshore of the western Alaska coast north of the Aleutian Islands and east of 170"W longitude. The FMP area is divided into two fishing areas, the Bering Sea subarea and the Aleutian Islands subarea, within which districts are defined for the purpose of spatially allocating the total allowable catch.

The Gulf of Alaska groundfish FMP was implemented in 1978 and has since been amended more than seventy times. The GOA FMP covers fisheries for all stocks of finfish except salmonids, halibut, herring, tuna, some rockfish species occurring primarily in state waters (0-3 nm), and lingcod. The GOA FMP man­agement area consists of the portions of the US EEZ in the North Pacific Ocean south of the Aleutian Islands and between the eastern Aleutian Islands at 1700W longitude and Dixon Entrance at 132°40W longitude.2

Although there have not been any commercial fisheries in the US Arctic to date, the North Pacific Fishery Management Council has developed the Arctic FMP. The council was concerned that prolonged ice-free seasons and possible temperature-induced changes in the distribution of commercially valuable species could lead to the development of commercial fisheries. Therefore, an Arctic FMP is needed to provide an adequate understanding of the abundance and dynamics of target and non-target species and an adequate framework to guard against over­fishing or adverse impacts to habitat or marine mammal populations.

Unlike the groundfish FMPs, the Arctic FMP was developed for the geo­graphical area of the Arctic, rather than for a specific fishery. It applies to all marine finfish and shellfish except salmon (which is jointly managed by the North Pacific Fishery Management Council and the state of Alaska) and halibut (which is

Managemmt 0/ L i{ling lv1arine Resources 311

managed under the terms of a treaty with Canada). Target fisheries are established for three species (arctic cod, saffron cod, and snow crab), and all other species are placed in an ecosystem components category that is off-limits to fishing. Optimum yield for the three target species is set to zero, thereby blocking the development of commercial fisheries until such time as sufficient information becomes available to suggest that such fisheries could be sustainable. The management area for the Arctic FMP (Fig. 5.2.2) is the US EEZ portions of the Chukchi and Beaufort Seas, north of the Bering Strait (from Cape Prince of Wales to Cape Dezhnev) and westward to the 1990 US-Russia maritime boundary and eastward to the US-Canada maritime boundary.3

State Management with Federal Oversight

The three remaining BvlPs include various degrees of delegated management to the state of Alaska. This management structure developed because at the time of the implementation of the Magnuson-Stevens Act, these fisheries were already

Arcti Management Area

Figure 5.2.2. Areas governed under the Arctic Area FMP.

•• .'" 0'1

312 NORTH BY 2020: PERSPECTIVES ON ALASKA'S CHANGI:-lG SOCIAL-ECOLOGICAL SYSTEMS

being managed by the state of Alaska. As the fisheries do occur in the federal waters of the EEZ, however, a joint management structure was developed. Because these FMPs involve a co-management relationship, they are less easily amended and the policy choice set is somewhat constrained by provisions of the Alaska Constitution (discussed above).

The Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands crab FMP covers fisheries for red, blue, and brown king crab, Tanner crab, and snow crab. As approved by the secretary of commerce in 1989, the BSAI FMP established a state-federal cooperative man­agement regime that defers in-season management to the state of Alaska with federal oversight over the total allowable catch setting process, habitat protec­tion, and access control measures. The BSAI FMP has been amended more than twenty times since its implementation and substantially modified following a 2004 amendment to the Magnuson-Stevens Act, which established individual fishing quotas and individual processing quotas. The BSAI king and Tanner crab FMP area corresponds with the groundfish FMP management area but is subdivided into state management districts.

The scallop FMP was approved in 1995 and has since been amended ten times. The fishery is jointly managed by the National Marine Fisheries Service and the Alaska Department of Fish and Game. The weathervane scallop FMP includes harvest areas in the BSAI and GOA regions.

The salmon FMP was developed in 1977, revised in 1980, and updated in 1990. Under this FMP, only limited troll fishing is allowed in the east area of the US EEZ. Management of salmon stocks and fisheries within state waters is deferred to the state of Alaska subject to treaty obligations. The salmon FMP cov­ers the entire US EEZ off Alaska, including the Arctic.

Federal Allocative Management under the Halibut Act

Fishing limits for halibut are determined by the International Pacific Halibut Commission, a bilateral organization between the United States and Canada, which was originally set up under the Halibut Convention in 1923. The North Pacific Fishery Management Council develops allocative management measures for the halibut commercial, sport, and subsistence fisheries, as recommendations for the secretary of commerce.

Resilience and Management of Alaska Region Fisheries

The governance and character of Alaska region fisheries have evolved through time in response to shifts in the abundance and distribution of particular target species,

iWanagemcnt ojLiving lviarin£ Resources 313

changes in the population status of a species with which the fisheries interact, and market or other economic factors. These changes have been driven byenvironmen­tal variation, climate change, and global economic processes. An ideal governance system would be resilient to these changes and would contribute to the resilience of ecological, social, and economic systems; however, some aspects of management under the Magnuson-Stevens Act and the Alaska regulatory structure are con­straining. Nonetheless, the fisheries management system in Alaska strives to be adaptive within these limits. Some regulatory structures allow for greater flexibil­ity than others. In general, those management systems that are put into place to address issue-specific concerns and problems lend themselves by necessity if not design to iterative approaches for solutions and management. Those that result from adherence to federal regulatory mandates tend to be less flexible.

Four examples of Alaska management actions are discussed below. The first two describe specific measures that have been put into place in Alaska. The regulatory structure has been able to adaptively respond to changing conditions in the first case, while in the latter instance the constraints of Magnuson-Stevens Act require­ments limit the council's flexibility. The second two examples highlight actions in which the council has specifically designed management tools to allow for adaptive management and plans for change.

Salmon Bycatch in the Bering Sea

The Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands pollock fishery is the largest US fishery. Although the bycatch rate is low (e.g., 1.2% by weight in 2007), it represents substantial levels of fish mortality (Fig. 5.2.3a, b). In 2007, for example, bycatch mortality included 286.6 metric tons of halibut, 345 mt of herring, 4,700 crabs, 121,800 Chinook salmon, and 97,600 other salmon (Hiatt et al. 2009). Salmon are a prohibited species in the federal offshore fisheries, which means that they can­not be targeted, and when caught accidentally, they must be discarded or donated to a food bank-they cannot be sold or retained. Nevertheless, both Chinook and non-Chinook salmon are caught as bycatch in large numbers in the eastern Bering Sea pollock trawl fishery.4 More than 700,000 non-Chinook salmon were caught in 2005, and more than 120,000 Chinook salmon were caught in 2007.

Management actions to decrease the salmon bycatch in the Bering Sea pol­lock trawl fishery began in the early 1980s with imposition of an overall cap of 55,250 Chinook salmon (amendments la, 3, and 8 to the BSAI groundfish FMP). The overall cap was apportioned to each nation licensed to operate in the foreign­directed and joint-venture trawl fisheries and prohibited those nations from fishing in the region once they exceeded their cap. Because the cap did not apply to vessels fishing in the domestic fishery, there was a need for new management measures

314 NORTH BY 2020: PERSPECTIVES ON ALASKA'S CHANGING SOCIAL-ECOLOGICAL SYSTEMS

a. ue b. -US

lIIII .. I- (JOG

J 11 ~-A. -U ICIO

• 0 1m 1111 Iftf 1IOtII tff1 "'" '.7 .,

Figure 5.2.3. Bycatches of (a) Chinook salmon and (b) non-Chinook salmon in Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands pollock fisheries. (Data for 1977-1990 are from Queirolo et al. [1995]; data for 1991-2009 are from www.fakr.noaa.gov/sustainablefisheries/inseason/.)

when the foreign and joint-venture fisheries were displaced by domestic fisheries in the late 1980s. The North Pacific Fishery Management Council replaced the annual bycatch cap with a system of time and area closures. In 1995, following a period of increased bycatches, the Bering Sea groundfish FMP was amended (amendment 2Ib) to create the Chum Salmon Savings Area and the Chinook Salmon Savings Area. These broad areas in the Bering Sea were annually closed to pollock fishing when a threshold bycatch level was reached. The identification of the areas was based on specific regions where historical bycatch levels had been highest. The Chinook Salmon Savings Area was modified in 1998 (amendment 58) to change the area closure configuration and establish a lower bycatch limit with seasonal timing.

These closures may have been effective during their initial implementation, but bycatch began to increase beginning around 2003 (Fig. 5.2.3a). Moreover, when the savings area closures were triggered, the fleet often encountered even higher bycatch rates in areas immediately outside of the closures. Concerned about the increasing bycatch rates, the pollock fleet began using their cooperative structure established under the American Fisheries Act (described in the section below) to establish a voluntary rolling hot spot program, which was designed to reduce bycatch and avoid triggering the area closures. In 2005, there were indications that Chinook bycatch was indeed higher outside of the triggered closure areas and evi­dence that the fleet's voluntary rolling hot spot program was more precise than the regulatory saving area closure mechanism. As a result, the BSAI groundfish FMP was again amended (amendment 84). This time, the portion of the pollock fleet participating in the voluntary rolling hot spot program was exempted from the salmon savings areas. This measure was intended to be an interim step while the council considered more comprehensive solutions for reducing salmon bycatch.

lvlanagement ofLh>ing 1l1arine Resources 315

In 2007, following the historic high in Chinook bycatch noted above, the council began exploring different options for bycatch management. It recognized that static time/area closures may not be the most appropriate means of reducing bycatch, particularly in light of shifting oceanographic conditions and variability in the bycatch of salmon by the fleet; there was need for a more resilient management strategy. The council also recognized that while the voluntary rolling hot spot pro­gram conferred the flexibility that regulatory closures could not, it failed to prevent the high amount of Chinook bycatch that occurred in 2007. After an extensive analysis, resulting in an environmental impact statement, the council eventually selected a unique blending of regulatory measures and fleet flexibility for manag­ing Chinook salmon bycatch. The council's program, to be implemented in 2011 by amendment 91 to the BSAI groundfish FMP, establishes transferable hard caps,s allocated by season and by sector (and cooperative for the inshore fleet). The unique aspect to this program, however, is that allowance is made (by virtue of a higher cap limit) to encourage industry to participate in Incentive Program Agreements. Under the Incentive Program Agreements, bycatch reduction programs are devel­oped and internally monitored by the fleet and designed to provide incentives for vessels to minimize bycatch levels. The use of the Incentive Program Agreement structure was specifically intended to encourage the fleet to reduce bycatch below the level of the selected cap, rather than a cap-only system in which careless fish­ers could exceed their share of the cap and cause fishing to be shut down for other fishers who had not yet exceeded their caps or completed their pollock quotas. This type of externality typically precipitates a derby-style fishery that dissipates value that could otherwise be obtained from the target catch.

The new Chinook bycatch management program under amendment 91 to the BSAI FMP was implemented in 2011. It may take several years of operation under the new program to determine if the goals of by catch reduction and fleet flexibility were conferred by this new management system, or if additional bycatch reduction measures will be necessary in the future. Additional measures are under devel­opment for chum salmon bycatch management in the Bering Sea and Chinook salmon bycatch management in the Gulf of Alaska, with council action scheduled for June 2011.

Status Determination Criteria and Rebuilding Plans

The Magnuson-Stevens Act national standard 1 states that "Conservation and management measures shall prevent overfishing while achieving, on a continuing basis, the OY from each fishery for the U.S. fishing industry."The specification of optimum yield and the conservation and management measures to achieve it must explicitly prevent overfishing. 'The National Marine Fisheries Service has published

316 NORTH BY 2020: PERSPECTIVES ON ALASKA'S CHANGING SOCIAL-ECOLOGICAL SYSTEMS

comprehensive guidance (50 CFR part 600) for the development of FMPs and FMP amendments that comply with the Magnuson-Stevens Act national stan­dards. If a stock is declared overfished, a rebuilding plan must be developed that specifies conservation and management measures to end overfishing and rebuild the stock within ten years.

Since 1998, four crab stocks in the Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands have been declared overfished, and rebuilding plans have been implemented for them. Three of the stocks were the target of directed fishing efforts (eastern Bering Sea snow crab, eastern Bering Sea Tanner crab, and St. Matthew blue king crab), but the fourth stock, the PribilofIslands blue king crab stock, has not had a directed fishery since 1999. Furthermore, prior to the overfished declaration, directed fishing for PribilofIslands red king crab was prohibited to prevent bycatch ofPribilofIslands blue king crab, and the area surrounding the PribilofIslands was closed to all bot­tom trawling to protect vulnerable blue king crab habitat. A rebuilding plan was implemented in 2003, which simply continued the directed fishery closures until such a time as the stock was completely rebuilt. There has, however, been no sign of recovery for this stock. While several years remain in the rebuilding time frame, a revised rebuilding plan is being considered that would close additional areas sur­rounding the Pribilof Islands (which may potentially be important crab habitat and/or areas of crab bycatch). Despite these proposed measures, however, the stock may remain at historically low levels.

It is likely that environmental regime shifts, and not fishing pressure, are the driving cause of the PribilofIslands blue king crab's decline and failure to rebuild. The current assessment of optimum biomass for this stock is based on a time frame during which oceanographic conditions may have been more favorable to this stock than they are under the current environmental regime. Despite this indication, regulatory requirements are inflexible in requiring the preparation of a new rebuilding plan. Optimum biomass could be re-specified to limit the time frame to only include current conditions, but this would lead to a determination that the stock is now "rebuilt" when in fact its stock status remains exactly the same, at low levels and with limited signs of recruitment. Moreover, it is unclear which oceanographic conditions are favorable to Pribilof Islands blue king crab and the probability that those conditions will reoccur is unknown. Thus, in prin­ciple the resource governance regime for these stocks is resilient, but in practice it is not.

Northern Bering Sea Research Area

The Northern Bering Sea Research Area was implemented in 2008 and is currently closed to groundfish fishing with nonpelagic trawl gear. The Northern Bering Sea

Management ~lLiving l"vfarine Resources 317

Research Area includes 54,858 square nautical miles in the northernmost portions of the eastern Bering Sea. The northern boundary is along a line between Cape Prince of Wales toward Cape Dezhnev to the 1990 US-Russia maritime boundary line, south to the southern end of St. Matthew Island, to and around the southern portion of Nunivak Island, and across Kuskokwim Bay, to Cape Newenharn. The areas around St. Lawrence Island, St. Matthew Island, Nunivak Island, and Etolin Strait are not part of the NBSRA but are closed to nonpelagic trawling under other provisions of the BSAI groundfish FMP.

The Northern Bering Sea Research Area was created because of concern that climate-induced shifts in the geographic distribution of commercially harvested fish species could lead to substantial increases in fishing effort in an area that is poorly known and has, until now, had relatively little fishing. To plan for orderly expansion of sustainable fishing into this area, the council banned non pelagic trawling until after completion of research to characterize benthic ecology and the likely impact of nonpelagic trawling on crab, marine mammals, spectacled eiders, and other endangered species, and the subsistence needs of western Alaska communities.

In creating the Northern Bering Sea Research Area, the council has the luxury of time. There are some indications that target groundfish, especially flatfish, in the Bering Sea are shifting their distribution northward, but currendy the industry has exerted no pressure to begin exploratory fishing operations in this area. Therefore, the council and the Alaska Fisheries Science Center are able to develop a delibera­tive process for designing an appropriate research plan that involves both industry and community stakeholders. Although the council has employed a static area clo­sure as an interim step to prevent unintended consequences from excessive fishing in this area, having the time to develop a research plan and appropriate measures to allow exploratory fishing under the research plan will create the flexibility needed to adapt to changing climate effects on fish populations. That is, faced with cli­mate-induced changes in the distribution of commercially important fish species, the council acted to preempt an expansion of active bottom-contact fishing gear into the Northern Bering Sea region until the resilience of the ecological system is better known. In this instance, the council selected a resilient governance regime that lends itself to amendment as the ecological system and stakeholder prefer­ences become better known.

Aleutian Islands Fishery Ecosystem Plan

The North Pacific Fishery Management Council developed the Aleutian Islands Fishery Ecosystem Plan in 2007 to improve understanding of important relation­ships among ecosystem components, to identifY areas of uncertainty and associated

318 NORTH BY 2020: PERSPECTIVES ON ALASKA'S CHANGING SOCIAL-ECOLOGICAL SYSTEMS

risks, and to emphasize the ecosystem context within which fisheries are man­aged. The Aleutian Islands Fishery Ecosystem Plan encompasses the US EEZ from Samalga Pass (169W) to the western boundary of the EEZ (170"E) and considers both federal and state fisheries even though the fisheries themselves are managed under groundfish and crab FMPs.

The Aleutian Islands ecosystem is complex and is the least predictable of the ecosystems managed by the North Pacific Fishery Management Council. The Fishery Ecosystem Plan identifies key ecosystem interactions, the status of which can be tracked by indicators. The interactions include climate and physi­cal factors, predator-prey relationships, fishing effects, regulatory constraints, and socioeconomic (both fishing and non-fishing) activities occurring in the region. Considerations highlighted in the plan are intended to influence management actions and amendments to the corresponding FMPs. Through an understanding of this ecological context, the council is better positioned to respond proactively to changing conditions in the region.

Fisheries of Alaska: History and Current Status

Throughout most of their history, fisheries off Alaska have primarily supported food and trade needs of Alaska's Native population. These subsistence fisheries relied on a wide variety of fish, invertebrates, marine mammals, seabirds, and algae, but with a particular focus on salmon, herring, hooligan, and halibut. The first com­mercial fisheries off Alaska began in the late 1800s with salt-cod fisheries in the Gulf of Alaska and Aleutian Islands, halibut fisheries in the Gulf of Alaska, and cannery-based salmon fisheries near the mouth of every major spawning stream from southeastern to western Alaska. Although ostensibly subject to oversight by the territorial government, the canneries had free rein to manage salmon harvests in their own self-interest. In contrast, the halibut fishery was largely a distant-water venture based out of Seattle and subject to an overall quota management structure stipulated in the Halibut Convention of 1923.

The groundfish fisheries began to develop after World War II as distant-water fleets from Japan, Russia, Korea, and Eastern Europe exhausted fishery resources adjacent to their own coasts and began to search farther afield. From the 1950s through the mid-1970s, these fleets engaged in a free-for-all that hammered Eastern Bering Sea stocks of Pacific perch, halibut, herring, sablefish, pollock, and various flatfish species. As discussed above, these fisheries were brought under fed­eral authority in 1976 with passage of the Magnuson-Stevens Act.

it1l1nl1gemmt of L i1nng 111arine R esoura5 319

Commercial Fisheries Catches and Value

In tonnage, catches from the marine fisheries off Alaska consist primarily of pol­lock, cod, flatfish (yellowfin sole, Greenland turbot, rock sole, arrowtooth flounder), salmon, and crab (king, Tanner, snow) (see Fig. 5.2.4a).

While the halibut and salmon fisheries date back to the late nineteenth cen­tury, the groundfish fisheries did not begin until after World War II. The ground­fish fisheries of the Gulf of Alaska are large in comparison to fisheries in other parts of the United States, but they are dwarfed by catches taken from the Bering Sea (Fig. 5.2.4b).

Although the total value (Fig. 5.2.5) of commercial landings of fish from the marine waters off Alaska is related to the tonnage landed, the value also depends directly on the quantities of competing seafood products from other regions and indirectly on the timing and pace of the fishery. All of these factors are influenced by the nature of governance regimes used to manage the fishery.

Although salmon catches have remained nearly constant since the mid-1980s, competition from farmed salmon and continued reliance on a governance regime that incentivizes the adoption of high-cost harvest technologies have driven prices, revenues, and profits to about 20% of their peak values. Halibut catches have also remained nearly constant over the past twenty-five years, but in contrast to salmon, the value of halibut catches increased substantially in the mid -1990s following conversion from an open access fishery governance regime to an Individual Fishing Qyota (IFQ2 regime. The IFQsystem created opportunity to extend the harvest season, improve product quality, and develop new markets willing to pay higher prices. Two major changes in groundfish fisheries governance have led to large increases in revenues. The first change was the shift from joint-venture production

a. u b. J

w.-2..S u

~ .......

UI 0ItMr i

f • .5 .~

• ..0 ..... eN

I

f \ .(

;

t.$ ~

0.0 ,.,. ,., '* JOOO O +--,--~'"r-'-··

1954 ,.... 1914 t1Io4 ,"'" ~

,------ 1 t lIS i !, AI I ; ,.~& I 1~"""""_J

Figure S.2.4. (al Catches of groundfish. halibut. and salmon from the EEl off Alaska by species complex; (b) Catches of groundfish from the EEl off Alaska by FMP region.

320 NORTH BY 2020: PERSPECTIVES ON ALAS KA'S C HANGING SOC lAL-ECOLOG1CAL SYSTEMS

50.1 ............................... ,.... ._ 1toM "" JI)04

Figure 5.25. Exvessel revenues for principal fisheries off Alaska.

in the mid- to late 1980s to fully domestic production beginning in the 1990s. The second governance transition began in the late 1990s with moratoria on the addition of new vessels into the fishing fleet, and especially with passage of the American Fisheries Act, which created a legal opportunity for the pollock fishery to transition away from a race-for-fish governance regime. Following passage of the American Fisheries Act, the pace of the pollock fishery slowed, product quality improved, and production shifted from low-value high-throughput product forms to high-value low-throughput forms, greatly increasing revenues per fish. These changes are described in additional detail in the following sections.

Salmon Management

Following statehood in 1959, Alaska banned the use of salmon traps and broke the power of the salmon canneries. One result was a rush of new entrants into the fish­ery, leading to congestion on the fishing grounds and making it difficult for fishery managers to maintain catch limits to ensure biologically sustainable management. To remedy these problems, the Alaska Legislature passed the License Limitation Act of 1972. The act created the Commercial Fisheries Entry Commission and directed it to limit the issuance of licenses in the salmon and herring and shellfish fisheries throughout the state. Limited entry capped the number of boats in each fishery and provided managers with the ability to constrain catch and improve escapements, but it failed to provide an effective limit on the escalation of fishing power and associ­ated pathologies of the race for fish (Rettig and Ginter 1978) (See Fig. 5.2.6a.)

Buoyed by strong prices caused by declines in salmon production in other regions along with strong runs brought about by improved biological management, exvessel revenues and the price of limited entry permits soared through the mid-1980s. However, by the late 1990s, increasing volumes of salmon were produced in mariculture operations based in Norway, Chile, the United Kingdom, and Canada (Fig. 5.2.6b). The increased supply of farmed Adantic salmon, coho salmon, and steelhead severely depressed the exvessel prices for Alaskan sockeye, coho, and

lvtanagmunt of Li~ting J'vIarine R esources 321

a . .. b. 1.ot

us ' fIttNI ..... .. . - .CMwIo,.,.., .- .~ ~ '* .... .. . - f .'*"-.... .. f (Nor .....

f \'00 .. · 1IOW<.MdI fI.1S .. ._<Mdt Q$

• IUS .. 0Gt

• 1m 't1J , .. ItIS ,tte ~ttS *'0 )005 .... - - - - - - - -Figure 5.2.6. (a) Alaskan catches of high-value salmon (millions); (b) World production of high-value Alaskan catches, rest-ot-world (ROW) catches, Chilean aquaculture, Norwegian aquaculture, UK aquacul­ture, Canadian aquaculture, and ROW aquaculture ..

Chinook salmon (Asche et al. 1999; Herrmann 1993; Knapp et al. 2007; Williams et al. 2009).1he collapse of exvessel prices created social and economic turmoil in salmon fishing communities because it reduced annual revenues to about one-fifth their peak level and at the same time reduced the asset value of limited entry per­mits to well below their outstanding loan value, bankrupting many salmon fishers (Greenberg et al. 2004; Herrmann et al. 2004).1hese effects were particularly pro­nounced in rural communities that went from controlling 50% of the limited entry permits in the late 1970s to controlling only 44% by 2005. That is, while limited entry increased the resilience of ecological and governance systems, it decreased the resilience of social and economic systems.

Halibut Management

Under fishing limits adopted following implementation of the Halibut Convention in the 1930s, halibut abundance and catches steadily increased through the 1950s before declining in the 1960s and early 1970s. The decline was largely a conse­quence of the adverse effects of foreign catches outside the 12-mile limits of US and Canadian territorial waters (Fig. 5.2.7a). Once the United States and Canada established exclusive management authority within their respective EEZs, the hal­ibut stock was rebuilt and catches again increased. However, the number of fishing vessels also increased and the season length collapsed from more than one hundred days to as little as two days (Fig. 5.2.7b). This heated race for fish reduced quality and suppressed market development, prevented rationalization of capital invest­ments, decreased safety, and increased the likelihood that catch limits would be exceeded (NRC 1999).

Concern that the race for fish reduced the resiliency of ecological, resource governance, and social-economic systems, the North Pacific Fishery Management

322 NORTH BY 2020: PERSPECTIVES ON ALASKA'S CHANGING SOCIAL-ECOLOGICAL SYSTEMS

a. aM

to

• ...

Council adopted an IFQprogram in 1991. It was approved by the secretary of commerce in 1993 and implemented in 1995. Under IFQ§, the fishery has reorga­nized to deliver high-quality fresh product throughout a protracted season. Safety at sea has improved, the number of active fishing vessels has been halved, ghost­fishing and bycatch losses have been reduced, and exvessel prices have increased (Herrmann and Criddle 2006; NRC 1999). However, the halibut IFQprogram has not been without controversy. As noted by Carothers (Chapter 5.5, this vol­ume), concern has been raised that some quota share recipients who were residents of small rural communities sold out of the fishery without considering adverse direct and indirect impacts on those communities. The percentage of halibut quota shares held by rural Alaskans increased from 14.6% in 1995 to 22.1 % in 2006, but the growth has been concentrated in larger rural communities and masks declines in some of the smallest communities. The effect of IFQ§ on the distribution of value between harvesting and processing sectors has also been controversial. For example, Matulich and Clark (2003) estimated that the pre-IFQhalibut proces­sors, already battered by declining salmon prices, lost market share and revenues as fishers bypassed traditional supply chains through contracts with niche processors and wholesalers. That is, some elements of this fishery became increasingly resilient under a market-based IFQmanagement strategy, while other historic participants lost due to market opportunities to cash in their halibut shares, and social resilience has been reduced for some fishers and their communities.

Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands Pollock

Shortly after implementation of the Magnuson-Stevens Act, the North Pacific Fishery Management Council adopted a suite of FMPs (discussed above) that greatly enhanced the resilience of fishery management and governance systems in the Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands and the Gulf of Alaska. However, as with the

b. !eO ---I NO

J J

- tm .,'" 19H 19n Itt!

Figure 5.2.7. (a) Biomass and commercial landings of Pacific halibut (thousand mt); (b) Season length, International PaCific Halibut Commission management Area 3A.

I'vlanagement ofLi~Jing lvlarine Resources 323

salmon and halibut fisheries, implementation of principles of biological sustain­ability did not lead to stabilization of fisher-dependent social and economic sys­tems. In fact, vessel loan subsidies and preferential access to US-flagged vessels led to a rapid expansion of fishing effort. At first, this expansion was accommodated by displacement of foreign catcher boats. It was then accommodated by displace­ment of the joint-venture processors and motherships, but by 1991, excess capac­ity existed in harvesting and processing in both the inshore and offshore sectors. Excess capacity led to season compression and wasteful harvesting and processing practices. To stimulate development of the shore-based sector, the NPFMC cre­ated a set of sector allocations (amendment 18 to the BSAI groundfish FMP). In addition to allocating shares of the pollock total allowable catch to the two sectors, the NPFMC set aside an allocation of7.5% of the pollock quota as a Community Development QIota (CDQ} to foster economic development of qualifYing west­ern Alaska communities (NRC 1998). The inshore-i)ffshore battle was reprised in 1995 (amendment 38 to the BSAI groundfish FMP) and again in 1998 (amend­ment 51 to the BSAI groundfish FMP). But because the inshore-i)ffshore amend­ments did not constrain burgeoning capacity or create a structure that would end the race for fish, seasons continued to compress and the fleet teetered on a financial brink. According to the At-sea Processors Association (1999) half of the BSAI catcher-processors underwent bankruptcy or forced sale of their vessel holdings in the four years from 1994 through 1998. Similar financial stress was present in the inshore sector.

Because Congress had imposed a moratorium on the creation of IF(2§, the NPFMC could not apply the governance structure used to successfully end the race for fish in the halibut and sablefish fisheries. Instead, representatives of the inshore and offshore sectors brokered a deal in Congress to set the sector alloca­tions in statute. The result was the American Fisheries Act of1998. The act created permanent sector allocations, placed a moratorium on the entry of new vessels, set parameters for the formation of cooperatives within sectors, provided funds to buyout nine of the twenty-nine then-active catcher-processors, and increased the quota share allocated to the CDQprogram. All sectors quickly organized under civil contracts that created subsector allocations to each firm (Criddle and Macinko 2000).

The American Fisheries Act has resulted in higher utilization rates (more pounds of finished product per pound of fish caught), a shift toward higher-value product forms, improved technical efficiency and capacity utilization (Felthoven 2002), increased economic returns, reduced bycatch, and improved management precision. It has also helped industry accommodate changes in fishing seasons and areas required to conserve Steller sea lions (NPFMC 2002). As with the halibut IFQprogram, it has been shown that the American Fisheries Act increased the

324 NORTH BY 2020: PERSPECTIVES ON ALASKA'S CHA:-IGING SOCIAL-ECOLOGICAL SYSTEMS

bargaining power of fishing boat owners relative to the processors to whom they deliver (Matulich et aI. 2001). Thus the act increased the resilience of governance and economic systems, but a larger share of the economic gains associated with the increased resilience accrued to a subset of the stakeholders.

The American Fisheries Act has created an imperative for devising analogous governance and management strategies for all other BSAl and GOA groundfish fisheries as a protection against the spillover of redundant capacity into adjacent fisheries. The act contained some sideboard restrictions to minimize this type of externality. Recent shifts in the center of abundance of pollock as well as the need to avoid salmon bycatch (see above) have forced the pollock fleet to fish at increased distances from port. When combined with high fuel prices, the need to fish at long distances from port caused the inshore sector to leave 10% of its 2007 B-season allocation unharvested. Thus, while the American Fisheries Act has increased the economic resilience of the pollock fishery, there are thresholds that, if exceeded, could trigger failure.

BSAI Crab Rationalization

Although there was a limited foreign tangle-net fishery for crab in the 1950s, the Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands crab fisheries took off in the 1960s as a domestic undertaking. As noted above, much of the management ofBSAl crab fisheries has been deferred to the state of Alaska. Alaska fishery managers relied on size-sex­season management to control catches, but as fishing capacity increased, season length became increasingly compressed, and the race for fish was on. Season com­pression is particularly hazardous in the BSAl crab fisheries because the fisheries occur in the winter and under conditions where shifts in ice cover can force vessels to operate in close proximity to one another and fish under adverse conditions to prevent competitors from preempting their fishing areas. In an effort to control the growth of fishing capacity, managers introduced limits on the number of pots (baited traps) per vessel (Greenberg and Herrmann 1994; Herrmann et aI. 1998). For minor crab stocks, managers introduced "super-exclusive" registration areas (Natcher et aI. 1996), and vessels fishing for crab in these areas were forbidden from fishing for crab in other areas. The effect of super-exclusive registration was to create a fishery that would be attractive only to a 10caI small-boat fleet.

Soft prices occasioned by competition from large harvests of crab in the Russian EEZ, coupled with a cyclic downturn in the abundance of legaI-sized male crab and the ongoing race for fish, led to financial distress that served as a stimulus to change to an IFQmanagement regime. In contrast to the halibut and pollock gov­ernance regimes, the BSAl crab rationalization program (NPFMC 2004) includes harvesting quota shares issued to fishing vessel owners and to skippers. It includes

lv!anagement of Living }.1aritle Resources 325

processing quota shares issued to shore-based and floating processors and allows communities to block the transfer of processing quota shares (NPfMC 2004). In the immediate aftermath of implementation of the BSAI crab IFQprogram, the number of actively fishing boats collapsed by about one-half Controversy contin­ues to rage about the effect of this program on the number of crew positions and whether the decrease in seasonal positions was offset by increases in full-time posi­tions. Like the halibutlsablefish IFQ.program and the pollock American Fisheries Act program, crab rationalization increased overall resilience of resource gover­nance and economic systems. However, the way that the benefits of rationalization were distributed among stakeholders contributed to the resilience of some com­munities and stakeholders but reduced resilience for others.

Discussion

The consequences of climate change to fisheries off Alaska will depend on how the fish population responds to the change and how the management and gover­nance system and social and economic systems accommodate change in fish popu­lation. Mueter et al. (Chapter 5.3) describe what is known about the response of BSAI fish stocks to anticipated climate variation. For most of these species, there is a range of variation that can be accommodated without collapse. For some spe­cies, this range of plasticity is wide; for others, it is narrow. Similarly, management and governance systems differ in their ability to accommodate external forcing. In general, the systems that incorporate features that harness individual self-interest through individual or collective ownership of catch shares are more resilient than traditional open-access or limited-entry programs. The resilience of social and eco­nomic systems is entwined with the resilience of management and governance sys­tems as well as with the underlying ecological system. Experience with share-based management systems in Alaska's fisheries suggests that the resilience of economic and social systems will vary across individuals and groups of stakeholders and that such systems may be more critically affected by the workings of larger economic and social forces.

References

Asche, F., H. Bremnes, and C. Wessels. 1999. Product aggregation, market integration,

and relationships between prices: Application to world salmon markets. American

Journal of Agricultural Economics 81, 568-581.

326 NORTH BY 2020: PERSPECTIVES ON ALASKA'S CHANGING SOCIAL-ECOLOGICAL SYSTEMS

At-sea Processors Association (APA).1999. Preliminary assessment of the Pollock

Conservation Cooperative. Seattle, WA: At-sea Processors Association.

Bader, H. 1998. Who has the legal right to foh? Constitutional and common law in Alaska

foheries management. Fairbanks: University of Alaska Sea Grant.

Criddle, K. R., and S. Macinko. 2000. A requiem for the IFQin US fisheries? Marine

Policy 24, 461-469.

Felthoven, R. 2002. Effects of the American Fisheries Act on capacity, utilization, and

technical efficiency. Marine Resource Economics 17,181-205.

Greenberg,]. A, and M. Herrmann. 1994. Pot limits in the Bristol Bay red king crab

fishery: An economic analysis. North American Journal of Fisheries Management 14,

307-317.

Greenberg,]. A, M. Herrmann, C. Hammel, and H. Geier. 2004. The application of farm

programs to commercial fisheries: The case of crop insurance for the Bristol Bay

commercial salmon fisheries.]ournal of Agribusiness 22(2),175-194.

Herrmann, M. 1993. Using an international econometric model to forecast Alaska salmon

revenues. Marine Resource Economics 8,249-271.

Herrmann, M., and K. R. Criddle. 2006. An econometric market model for the Pacific

halibut fishery. Marine Resource Economics 21, 129-158.

Herrmann, M.,]. A. Greenberg, and K. R. Criddle. 1998. Proposed pot limits for the

Adak brown king crab fishery: A distinction between open access and common prop­

erty.Alaska Fishery Research Bulletin 5,25-38.

Herrmann, M.,]. A. Greenberg, C. Hamel, and H. Geier. 2004. Extending the federal

crop insurance program to commercial fisheries: The case of Bristol Bay, Alaska

salmon. North American Journal of Fisheries Management 24,352-366.

Hiatt, T., R. Felthoven, M. Dalton, B. Garber-Yonts, A Haynie, D. Lew,]. Sepez, C.

Seung, and Northern Economics. 2009. Stock assessment and fishery evaluation

report for the groundfish fisheries of the Gulf of Alaska and Bering Seal Aleutian

Islands Area: Economic status of the groundfish fisheries off Alaska, 2008. Seattle,

WA: NOAA Fisheries Alaska Fishery Science Center.

Knapp, G., C. A. Roheim, and]. L. Anderson. 2007. 1he great salmon run: Competition

between wild and farmed salmon. TRAFFIC North America. Washington DC: World

Wildlife Fund.

Macinko, S. 1993. Public or private?: United States commercial fisheries management and

the public trust doctrine, reciprocal challenges. Natural Resources Journal 33, 919-955.

Matulich, S. C., and M. Clark. 2003. North Pacific halibut and sablefish IFQpolicy

design: C2.1JantifYing the impacts on processors. Marine Resource Economics 18,

149-167.

Matulich, S. C., M. Sever, and F. Inaba. 2001. Fisheries cooperatives as alternatives to

ITC2§: Implications of the American Fisheries Act. Marine Resource Economics 16,

1-16.

lvlanagement oj-Living l'v1arinc &sourus 327

McCay, B.]. 1998. Oyster wars and the public trust. Tucson: University of Ariwna Press.

Natcher, W.,]. A. Greenberg, and M. Herrmann. 1996. Economic evaluation of super­

exclusive designation for the summer Norton Sound red king crab fishery. In High

latitude crabs: Biology, management, and economics. Fairbanks: University of Alaska Sea

Grant.

National Research Council (NRC). 1995. The Community Development Quota Program in

Alaska and lessonsfor the western Pacific. Washington DC: National Academy Press.

National Research Council (NRC). 1999. Sharing the fish: Toward a national policy on indi­

vidual fishing quotas. Washington DC: National Academy Press.

North Pacific Fishery Management Council (NPFMC). 2002. Impacts of the American

Fisheries Act. Anchorage, AK: North Pacific Fishery Management Council.

North Pacific Fishery Management Council (NPFMC). 2004. Bering Sea Aleutian

Islands Crab Fisheries Final Environmental Impact Statement. Anchorage, AK:

North Pacific Fishery Management Council.

North Pacific Fishery Management Council (NPFMC). 200S. Bering Sea Chinook

Salmon Bycatch Management Draft Environmental Impact Statement I Regulatory

Impact Review I Initial Regulatory Flexibility AnalYSis for Amendment 91 to the

Fishery Management Plan for Groundfish of the Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands

Management Area. Anchorage, AK: North Pacific Fishery Management Council.

Pew Oceans Commission. 2003. America's living oceans: Charting a course for sea change.

Arlington, Virginia: Pew Oceans Commission.

Olteirolo, L. E., L. W. Fritz, P. A. Livingston, M. R. Loeffiad, D. A. Colpo, and Y. L. deReynier. 1995. Bycatch, utilization, and discards in the commercial ground­

fish fisheries of the Gulf of Alaska, Eastern Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands. US

Department of Commerce, NOAA Tech. Memo. NMFS-AFSC-5S.

Rettig, R. B., and]. C. Ginter (eds.). 1978. Limited entry as a fishery management tool.

Seattle: UniverSity of Washington Press.

Simmons, R. T. 2007. Property and the public trust doctrine. PERC Policy Series PS-39,

Bozeman, MT.

Williams, A. H., M. Herrmann, and K. R. Criddle. 2009 . The effects of Chilean salmon

and trout aquaculture on markets for Alaskan sockeye salmon. North American

Journal if Fisheries Management 29,1777-1796.

Witherell, D. (ed.). 2005. Managing our nation'sfoheries II- Focus on the fUture. Anchorage,

AK: North Pacific Fishery Management Council.

328 NORTH BY 2020: PERSPECTIVES ON ALASKA'S CHAKGING SOCIAL-ECOLOGICAL SYSTEMS

Endnotes

1 The 1988 agreement between the United States and USSR shifted the boundary

westward from the convention line of 1867. The United States ratified the agree­

ment in 1990, but the Russian Federation has yet to do so. Nevertheless, the Russian

Federation is provisionally applying the maritime boundary agreement, and the US

position is that the maritime boundary is in force.

2 Dispute over the position of the US-Canada maritime boundary at Dixon Entrance

is unresolved.

3 Dispute over the position of the US-Canada maritime boundary in the Beaufort Sea

is unresolved.

4 For catch accounting purposes there are two categories of prohibited salmon species,

Chinook and non-Chinook. The latter category includes four salmon species: chum,

pink, sockeye, and silver. However, species composition from observer sampling of

bycatch from pollock fisheries shows that on average over 99.8% of salmon caught

under the non-Chinook category are chum salmon (NPFMC 2008).

5 A "hard cap" indicates a bycatch limit that, when reached, results in a fishery closure

for the remainder of the season or for the year, depending on the cap structure. This

differs from a "trigger cap," which by design triggers the closure of an area to fishing,

while fishing may continue to occur outside of that area.