Protection of Wetlands Is Crucial to State’s Economy, Report Contends

Maintaining that protection of California’s wetlands is more economical than losing them to development and pollution, a group of environmentalists released a report Thursday contending that marshes and bays are crucial to the state’s $1-billion-a-year fishing industry.

The environmentalists consider the findings as ammunition for their campaign next week to persuade Congress to enhance federal protection of wetlands.

In California, commercial anglers catch $200-million worth of seafood each year, and about 1.5 million sportfishermen pursue fish produced in wetlands, according to the report by consultants for more than 100 environmental organizations and fishing groups in a coalition called Campaign to Save California Wetlands.

Three-quarters of the nation’s $4-billion annual harvest of fish and seafood comes from varieties that are dependent on wetlands for breeding and feeding, according to National Marine Fisheries Service data included in the report.

“The fishing industry, once a very active and productive business venture in Los Angeles and Orange counties, today is almost nonexistent in our coastal waters. This change can be attributed largely to the loss of huge amounts of coastal wetlands,” said Marcia Hanscom, Southern California coordinator of the coalition.

Compared to a century ago, 91% of California’s salt marshes, bays, freshwater ponds and other wetlands have been drained or filled, a loss greater than that of any other state, federal officials say.

Many species of fish use the shallow water of wetlands to reproduce. Wetlands also provide nesting and foraging grounds for waterfowl, and assist in cleaning ground water.

“It is infinitely more economical to protect aquatic ecosystems than to struggle to restore or replicate them,” says the report, written by William Kier, a fisheries management consultant in Sausalito and former assistant secretary of the California Resources Agency.

Opponents to stronger protection of wetlands, mostly farmers and developers, frequently cite the impact on jobs and the economy in agricultural and urban areas. They have been trying to exempt smaller parcels and areas that are dry much of the year.

Gordon Cotta, who is part of a commercial fishing association in Santa Barbara, said 75% of the nation’s commercial and sports fisheries are “wetland dependent.”

“Over the last decade, loss of wetlands has largely contributed to a 30% decline in California’s commercial landings of inshore dependent fish and shellfish. That is one of the major reasons the Southern California fishing industry is struggling,” Cotta said.

The report estimates that the herring harvest from San Francisco Bay has brought anglers nearly $10 million in recent years. Halibut, which breed in shallow coastal wetlands, are worth $2 million to $3 million a year.

As an example of how wetlands restoration benefits the economy, the report notes that when wetlands that protected Humboldt Bay from runoff were filled, the state health department restricted the area’s $5-billion-a-year oyster harvest. But when the town of Arcata restored some of them to retain waste water, the state allowed oyster fishermen more harvesting days.

Twenty California environmentalists are flying to Washington next week to lobby for a bill by Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) that would strengthen protection in several ways, including an expansion of the types of activities that require federal permission.