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A Special Report
National Marine Fisheries Service Meeting of 2/28/99
On Thursday evening, February 18, over 400 New Jersey commercial fishermen and others met met with federal officials at the Barnegat Light's Fire Co. Hall to discuss new regulations being considered by the National Marine Fisheries Service. The proposed regulations are intended to place new limitations and restrictions on catches of Atlantic billfish and swordfish, bluefin tuna, yellow fin tuna, and sharks, varieties the fisheries service considers overfished.
The fisheries service, a federal agency, intends to restrict commercial and recreational fishing by use of size limits, time area closures, and quotas, the goal being to rebuild the fish stocks. The problem is, the focus on that goal ignores the fact that limitations on fishing in the Atlantic ocean are meaningless if not applied to the international fishing industry as a whole. International laws are needed to bring other countries' fisheries into compliance with the same regulations placed on local fisheries, since they are fishing the same fish stocks in the same ocean.
Officials from the fisheries service came to listen to the views of the local fishermen and possibly modify the proposals based on their input. Regional fishermen and their associates in the industry vehemently disagreed with most of the regulations proposed. In their view, if the proposals are implemented, they would put the longliners out of business. The longliners and other boats in the fishing fleet bring the fresh seafood we Americans enjoy so much to the local restaurants, markets, and our dinner tables. The local fishermen feel that they abide by strict regulations while fishermen from other countries simply ignore them, overfish at will, and then send their fish to American markets at a cheaper price than the American-caught fish.
The only effective way to manage fish stocks is to manage them internationally. Local commercial fishermen are also concerned that, in enforcing conservation, the federal government makes no attempt to monitor the amount of fish caught by recreational fishing boats. Commercial fishermen must log every fish caught and report the data to the government, but recreational fishermen are under no such obligation. Thus the government does not have sufficient data to make informed decisions about the depletion of stocks. Commercial fishermen at the continental shelf are usually greatly outnumbered by recreational boats, yet the government has no idea what the recreational boats are catching.
Barnegat Light's commercial fishermen would like to see the government improve the efficiency and accuracy of its data gathering before making and enforcing drastic regulations. Most of the townspeople of Barnegat Light are in full support of their fishing industry, and would like to see it survive. Barnegat Light derives a great deal of its charm and benefits to its local economy through being, at heart, a fishing village.
Shirley A. 2/19/98
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