LEGISLATION : Fishermen Warily Circle Plan to Impose Quotas on Catches

Congress is considering legislation that would open the door for sweeping changes in the U.S. fishing industry, allowing regulators to replace traditional open-market fishing with a quota system limiting the amount each fisherman can catch.

The proposal, designed to eliminate overfishing that has pushed many fisheries into decline, is splintering the industry into a host of competing interests.

“It involves foreign interests and domestic interests, onshore and offshore processors, small fishermen and big companies,” said Margaret Hall, executive director of Independent Fishermen for Fair Quotas, which is based in Seattle. “All of those people are on different sides.”

The idea itself is fairly simple. Congress would give regulators more power to end the age-old system that allows commercial fishermen to take as many fish as they can during fishing season. In its place would be quotas tailored to a fisherman’s past catches.

Advocates hail the legislation as a fair and reasonable solution to dwindling fish stocks. Quotas will reduce overfishing and stabilize the market by stretching the season over a longer period. And supporters argue that restricting boats will eliminate safety risks created by the “race for fish” as a fishing season opens.

But critics warn that it gives a huge advantage to corporations, threatening the livelihoods of thousands of independent fishermen and many seafaring communities.

“Small fishermen have been around for several thousand years,” said Ronnie Pellegrini, a member of a fourth-generation fishing family in Eureka, Calif. “In the last 20 [years], look at all of the problems when people look at fishing as an investment and not as a way of life.”

Pellegrini is one of many fishermen who have teamed up with the activist environmental group Greenpeace to fight quotas and who have come to Washington this summer in hopes of getting Congress to reject quotas.

Fishing in U.S. waters is regulated by eight regional councils. With about 40% of the nation’s fisheries facing decline, many of the councils have considered or adopted systems, such as quotas, that impose restrictions more specific than a limit on the season.

Those systems, however, have created uncertainty and confusion, chiefly because U.S. fishing law provides little in the way of instructions for how they should be run. So as Congress prepares for its five-year renewal of the Magnuson Act, which manages fishing in a 200-mile zone off U.S. shores, lawmakers are considering adding guidelines about quota systems.

Quotas operate somewhat like shares of stock. Each year, each regional council would decide how much of a type of fish should be caught. Then that total would be divided into shares among fishermen, with each share--or quota--determined by the amount the fisherman has caught in the past.

The initial quota shares are allocated free. But thereafter, the shares can be bought, sold or leased--an aspect of the system many small fishermen argue will give a big advantage to corporations with the money to buy large numbers of shares. They also warn that it would block new fishermen from getting into the business.

Although results in Alaska are preliminary, Steve Pennoyer, the Alaska regional director for the National Marine Fisheries Service, said the halibut season has been extended by several months under the new system, and that prices fishermen are given by processors have been stable.

But opponents of quotas say they are unfairly allotted. They also say the system does not, in fact, conserve fish because, by removing the pressures of a short fishing season, fishermen can sort through their catch and throw back smaller ones, which often die.

Some fishermen want Congress to ban quota systems, while others are pushing for a moratorium on quotas until existing systems can be studied.

National Marine Fishery Service officials all say quota systems would not work in all fisheries. Congress is expected to vote on the Magnuson Act renewal this month.