By Tom Walsh

Overall, the report by the NOAA Fisheries Service concludes that fishing pressure was reduced on 10 of the 19 groundfish stocks studied.

Population sizes for at least six of the 19 stocks increased by an average of 50 percent over the same period.

“What we really need is to sit down collectively as a group and figure out a way to reduce the number of codfish being caught. We need to keep making adjustments in fishing strategies, but I’m not sure the people who are fishing cod are too receptive.” — Ted Ames, Stonington Fisheries Alliance

“The bottom line of this report is that, over a three-year period, we’ve had good overall success in bringing fishing rates down, but not as successful in getting the biomass (fish size and numbers) to rise,” said Teri Frady, an FOAA Fisheries Service spokesman.

The report estimates the 23,800 metric tons of Gulf of Maine cod old enough to spawn in 2001 was reduced to 18,800 metric tons by 2004, a 21 percent decline.

For Georges Bank cod, the report shows 22,564 metric tons in 2004, a 25 percent decrease from 2001.

“The results we saw with cod were anticipated because very few young fish were coming into the population at the time this data was collected,” Frady said. “With fishing rates for cod down by as much as 50 percent and with an above-average number of fish born in 2003, that could really start to bring that stock up.”

Ted Ames of Stonington, board chairman of the Penobscot East Resource Center and a member of the Stonington Fisheries Alliance, termed the report a “reality check.”

“Codfish have really been depleted in the eastern Gulf of Maine for quite a while,” he said. “To the west they are more abundant, but they’ve never recovered in this area. Without a doubt, cod stocks are not getting stronger.

“What we really need is to sit down collectively as a group and figure out a way to reduce the number of codfish being caught,” he said. “We need to keep making adjustments in fishing strategies, but I’m not sure the people who are fishing cod are too receptive.”

The new analysis was released in advance of last week’s meeting of the New England Fishery Management Council in Providence, R.I. It updates 2001 stock assessments with data gathered between 2002 and 2004.

The complete report is available online at www.nefsc.noaa.gov/nefsc/publications/crd/crd0513/. 

The report classifies all 19 stocks monitored with regard to whether they are overfished. Compared to 2001, the new data shows no change in the status of 14 stocks, while two stocks showed improvement and three lost ground.

The report notes that, during the last eight months of that period, fishing rules were significantly tightened through new Amendment 13 regulations designed to end overfishing and to promote stock replenishment.

“Eliminating overfishing is an important prerequisite to rebuilding stocks to sustainable levels, as seen in several species, such as George’s Bank haddock,” said John Boreman, director of NOAA’s Northeast Fisheries Science Center.

“Clearly we have much more work to do in rebuilding the entire complex, but I am encouraged by these analyses, which show that overfishing has been significantly reduced for many species.”

Environmentalists concerned about declining cod and flounder populations don’t share Boreman’s upbeat analysis.

“It is simply irresponsible for New England’s fisheries managers to continue to allow overfishing on Georges Bank cod and other groundfish populations,” Roger Fleming, a senior attorney with the Conservation Law Foundation, said in a prepared response to the NOAA report.

“Unfortunately, this report confirms that the status of key groundfish stocks like Georges Bank cod are even worse than we feared,” he said.

“And the news on Gulf of Maine cod and our yellowtail flounder stocks is also very bad, as fishing rates on those stocks are over two to three times sustainable levels.”

Priscilla Brooks, director of CLF’s Marine Conservation Program, said she fears northeastern cod populations may be following the same path as cod populations in Atlantic Canada, where widespread overfishing of stocks off Newfoundland and Labrador prompted a moratorium on cod fishing.

“We have only to look at our neighbors in Canada to understand what could happen to our own cod populations and fishing industry if we do not take immediate action to stop overfishing and restore this critically important species,” Brooks said.