Call to action to support menhaden
Friday, Dec. 14, is the day when all recreational anglers can stand up for the “most important fish in the ocean” and have an impact on the future of fishing in the Chesapeake Bay. That’s the date when the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) will meet to determine the future of menhaden.
ASMFC’s Menhaden Management Board is expected to act on Amendment II to the Atlantic Menhaden Fishery Management Plan, and, if adopted, it could the be first step in restoring the abundance of menhaden. Menhaden are a primary food source for every marine predator on the East Coast and are currently overfished.
“Working with the Chesapeake Bay Foundation and other groups, CCA Maryland is striving to bring busloads of concerned conservationists who want to see menhaden managed properly,” said Tony Friedrich, CCA MD executive director. “We understand that the union representing workers at Omega Protein are planning to fill the ASMFC meeting room. It’s essential that members of the conservation community attend this meeting in force.”
(Omega Protein is the company that harvests menhaden to produce Omega-3 and has had a major influence in reducing the menhaden stock.)
CCA Maryland and the other groups will provide buses to take conservationists to the meeting in Baltimore. The buses will leave the Riva Road Park-N-Ride lot (Harry S. Truman Prkwy and Riva Road) at 7:15 a.m. on Dec. 14. An early bus will leave the meeting around the lunch hour for those who need to return early, and another bus will leave at 3 p.m.  The meeting will run from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. at the Best Western Plus Hotel and Conference Center in Baltimore.  We will also provide breakfast, lunch, refreshments and even a “Save the Menhaden” long sleeve t-shirt with artwork by Jay Fleming. If your schedule prevents you from taking the bus, we’d still love to see you at this meeting.
“Those supporting us at the meeting will not be asked to make comments, but it’s imperative that a large number of individuals supporting Amendment II are there,” Friedrich said.
The future of menhaden is at stake. Countless hours of work from dozens of groups is culminating on one meeting on one day.  December 14, 2012 can be a day we all look back on as a landmark victory for our fisheries.  Can you please help us, help menhaden, and help our treasured Chesapeake Bay by attending this one meeting?
You must RSVP for a seat on one of the buses.  Contact  tony@ccamd.org with the subject line “menhaden”.  All we need are the names of those attending and we will take care of everything else.

Reduction Industry Crosses the Line

By Richen Brame
Coastal Conservation Association
Atlantic Fisheries Director

The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission Technical Committee (TC) and Stock Assessment Committee (SAC) process is supposed to be a simple one that allows the members, who come from state agencies, federal agencies and academia, to do the technical work necessary to manage marine fisheries. One primary object of this process is to allow only qualified, independent scientists to populate the committees, who can be expected to produce results that are not biased towards any one sector or another. Such scientists insulated from the grind of fishery politics are the very engine on which marine fisheries management runs.
The Commissioners may be the drivers, but the TC and SAC folks provide the horsepower. This process can quickly fall apart if it appears that someone with an agenda is sitting on the committee. Earlier this week, I witnessed just such an event, perhaps the most egregious I’ve seen in attending TC and SAC meetings for 13 years.
To set the scene, the Menhaden Stock Assessment Subcommittee and Technical Committee met to determine what information will go into an assessment update, essentially the data from 2009-2011 which was collected since the last benchmark assessment. As is well known, menhaden are undergoing overfishing and the Board recently set new fishing mortality reference points that are more conservative than the old reference points. To end overfishing, the Board is currently developing Amendment 2 to the Fishery Management Plan (FMP) for Atlantic menhaden, which will reduce menhaden harvest for all harvesters.
As is also well known, this will be the first time the menhaden reduction industry – Omega Protein in Reedville, Virginia – will have to operate under a quota and will have to limit its harvest to end overfishing.
It was no surprise, then, that Omega Protein hired two pre-eminent stock assessment scientists to represent them at the TC and SAC meeting. Many groups, including Coastal Conservation Association, had representatives there to observe the proceedings. But the Omega representatives went a step further and interacted freely with the Committee. One of them spoke more than any member of the stock assessment committee. At one point, he essentially led the discussion on what sensitivity analyses were appropriate for the assessment.
This type of interaction is out of bounds, and it casts doubt on the validity of these proceedings. It threatens to make a mockery of the process and transport it back to the dark days when reduction industry representatives controlled both the Menhaden Management Board and the Technical Committee.
The two scientists hired by Omega are some of the best-known stock assessment experts in the world, and their opinions should be available to the SAC and TC, but in a controlled fashion that is fair to all. What the Omega representatives contributed at that meeting may very well have been useful or valuable, but the manner in which they presented it was entirely inappropriate, and tainted the legitimacy of the meeting. Regardless of what they said, the appearance of impropriety cannot be avoided. As paid representatives of Omega Protein, they are at that meeting for one purpose and one purpose only – to represent Omega’s interests. Would they bother to attend such a meeting if the stock was not undergoing overfishing and Omega was not faced with reductions in harvest for the first time in its history?
I think not.
The ASMFC currently has guidelines on public participation under development, but those will not be approved until October. The Committee Chair and staff person are there to facilitate discussion, not referee who gets to speak and who doesn’t. In the meantime, conservationists are left to wonder about a process that appears tainted. As has happened in the past with this highly political fishery, it appears that the ASMFC is allowing the fox to guard the henhouse. Again.
Conservationists and recreational anglers have come too far in our efforts to protect a critical forage base to let these machinations go unchallenged. The ASMFC must rein in Omega Protein and not allow it to gain control of the menhaden management process. Its failure to do so risks destroying any trust the public has in its ability to manage our marine resources.

The most comprehensive article written on menhaden in recent history. Find out why these little fish my be managed properly.
A Fish Story

For immediate release – Nov. 9, 2011

A new day for menhaden management

Commission vote reduces menhaden harvest for first time ever

BOSTON, MA - For the first time in history, there will be reductions in the harvest of Atlantic menhaden after a vote today by the Menhaden Management Board of the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC). Menhaden, which serve as the primary forage base for most predatory fish, have declined to the lowest level ever recorded, sparking alarm in the recreational angling community which has long expressed concern over the impact of industrial menhaden harvest on sportfish stocks.

“This is a long-anticipated decision and it is a great relief for anglers to know that managers have finally begun the process of rebuilding this critical species,” said Charles A. Witek III, chairman of the Atlantic Fisheries Committee for Coastal Conservation Association. “The turning point was finally having science in hand that showed what many of us have been saying for a long time. We still have work to do to ensure that menhaden are properly managed to fulfill its role as a forage base, but we are finally out of the starting blocks.”

Anglers and conservationists have chafed for years under management standards that indicated the spawning stock of menhaden was perfectly healthy and the fishing mortality rate was fine or only “slightly” over the overfishing threshold. As menhaden began to disappear from parts of the coast, it became clear that something was wrong with the way menhaden were being evaluated. Ultimately, outside scientists recommended changing reference points to better reflect the status of the stock and in a landmark decision, the Board agreed. With today’s vote, the reference points change from the current 8 percent Maximum Spawning Potential (MSP), which means 8 percent of an unfished stock, to 15 percent MSP as the overfishing threshold.  They then adopted a target, the point for which management measures are intended, of 30 percent MSP, which will require a 37 percent reduction in harvest when implemented.

“The most critical thing that happened today is that the debate over whether or not to manage menhaden at all, is over,” said Richen Brame, CCA Atlantic Fisheries director. “Clearly these fish do indeed need to be managed, and managed conservatively. The debate now becomes about how conservatively should they be managed, and that is a much better scenario for menhaden, for sportfish and for anglers. It took a very long time and a lot of work by many, many groups, but the ASMFC did the right thing today.”

During the public comment period leading up to this vote, the ASMFC received almost 92,000 comments, the overwhelming majority of which were in favor of reductions in menhaden harvest by the greatest amount available. With today’s decision, the focus will now turn to the next management action that will determine exactly how to implement those reductions.

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CCA is the largest marine resource conservation group of its kind in the nation. With almost 100,000 members in 17 state chapters, CCA has been active in state, national and international fisheries management issues since 1977. For more information visit the CCA Newsroom at www.JoinCCA.org.