Urge NOAA to protect our oceans from an increased risk of overfishing
In recent years, many U.S. fish populations are rebounding after years and sometimes decades of overfishing. But, significant problems remain, including challenges associated with changing ocean conditions, such as warming waters and habitat destruction.
Unfortunately, a proposal from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Fisheries Service (NOAA Fisheries) to update national fishery management guidelines could promote practices that increase the risk of overfishing, stretch out plans to rebuild vulnerable fish populations, and entirely avoid managing some fish that are in need of conservation.
This proposal would revise the agency's National Standard 1 guidelines: its direction for how fishery managers can prevent overfishing and achieve sustainable catch levels that benefit the nation. But instead of seizing this opportunity to make improvements, such as reducing the unintended catch of non-targeted fish and wildlife, ensuring enough forage fish to feed dependent predators, or protecting fish habitats, NOAA Fisheries is lowering the bar for fisheries management.
Luckily, there is still time to weigh in and help guide U.S. fisheries management in the right direction. NOAA Fisheries is accepting public comments through June 30, 2015.
Sign the petition today and with your help, we can convince the agency to fix this risky proposal and move forward with guidelines that work for the long-term benefit of the oceans and the nation.
Dear Dr. Patrick,
I am writing to express serious concerns with the proposed revisions to the National Standard 1 Guidelines (NOAA-NMFS-2012-0059). NOAA Fisheries should ensure that any revisions reinforce rather than jeopardize the progress the current guidelines have helped secure in ending overfishing and restoring fish populations. I am concerned that this proposal promotes strategies that increase the risk of overfishing, such as allowing inaction on overfishing in individual years by allowing averaging, delaying needed quota reductions, and increasing quotas without a thorough understanding of a fish population’s health. It would also delay the restoration of overfished stocks and allow some species that need conservation to be removed from management altogether.
Additionally, the current proposal misses an opportunity to address new and ongoing threats to our oceans such as habitat destruction, warming waters, inadequate forage fish populations, and indiscriminate fishing practices. The revised guidelines should take steps to tackle these challenges by promoting a more comprehensive approach that considers the impacts of fishing on ocean ecosystems, as well as how changes in those ecosystems affect fishing.
[Your comment]
I call on NOAA Fisheries to modify its proposed revisions to prevent backsliding on efforts to restore fish populations and end overfishing, while moving management toward a more comprehensive approach that will work for the long-term benefit of the oceans and the nation.
Sincerely,
[Your Name]
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