Global Warming Spurs Commercial Fishing Moratorium in US Arctic

Global warming spurs commercial fishing moratorium in U.S. Arctic
By Hal Bernton
206-464-2581 or hbernton@...
Seattle Times staff reporter
Friday, February 6, 2009

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Spurred by global warming concerns in the U.S. Arctic, a federal fishery council
on Thursday established a moratorium on commercial seafood harvests in a vast
zone off Alaska's northern coast.

In a unanimous vote in Seattle, the North Pacific Fishery Management Council
approved the plan in response to the dramatic retreat of summertime ice in
Arctic waters.

The plan covers a nearly 200,000-square-mile area stretching from the Bering
Strait waters near Russia to the U.S. maritime boundary with the Canadian
Arctic. The plan will be forwarded to the U.S. Commerce Department for final
approval, and would be a boost to State Department efforts to negotiate similar
fishing closures off the Arctic coasts of Canada and the Russian Far East.

There are currently no commercial harvests in the federal waters of the U.S.
Arctic, which stretch from 3 to as far as 200 miles offshore through the Chukchi
and Beaufort seas.

But many believe that pressures to fish those areas will increase in the years
ahead if warming waters cause a migration there of pollock and other species
that now sustain major harvests farther south in the Bering Sea.

"The rate of change in the Arctic is fairly well understood," said David Benton,
executive director of the Marine Conservation Alliance, which represents
commercial fishing groups, processors and Alaska communities. "What is not
understood is the way that it's going to affect the marine environment and the
Arctic people."

The council is a mix of federal, state and industry officials who help set the
rules guiding North Pacific commercial harvests, which are the largest in North
America.

Their plan would not impose a permanent ban on commercial fishing. Fishing would
be allowed only if additional surveys indicate harvests could be sustainable and
not harm the broader marine ecosystem.

"This is a precautionary approach," said Eric Olson, a Native Alaskan who chairs
the federal council. "It's protective. It lays out a framework for fisheries
development in the Arctic."

The summer ice pack retreated to its lowest level on record in 2007, and last
summer marked the second-smallest ice pack. Climate scientists expect that
global warming, caused by the buildup of greenhouse-gas emissions in the
atmosphere, will cause the melting of the summer ice pack in Arctic waters by
about 2030.

There have been relatively few surveys of fishery stocks in the U.S. Arctic. The
latest effort was last summer, when federal fisheries scientists in Seattle
chartered a fishing vessel for a three-week cruise. The top species found in the
survey included Arctic cod, a fish that is important for Arctic marine birds and
mammals, and snow crab, according to Elizabeth Logerwell, the lead federal
biologist.

The survey nets also caught small amounts of pollock, Pacific cod and Bering
flounder, three commercial fish Logerwell said were not noted in a 1977 survey.
Small numbers of the species might have always inhabited the waters, or they may
have migrated north in recent decades as summer ocean ice retreated.

The plan's passage reflects an unusual consensus between the fishing industry
and conservationists. Jim Ayers, vice president of the environmental group
Oceana, called the plan a "model for management of the Arctic Ocean." He said he
found common ground with industry officials in numerous late-night conversations
fueled by coffee and whiskey shots.

The plan also has garnered support from Native Alaskans in the Arctic. They are
wary of the impacts of a large-scale commercial harvest upon whales, seals and
other marine life that support their subsistence harvests.

But there is interest in the king crab that now congregate in federal waters off
Kotzebue in northwest Alaska. If surveys indicate a sustainable harvest is
possible, officials of the regional borough would like to leave that option open
for a local fleet.

State Department officials say they already are discussing ocean conservation
measures in other Arctic areas.