Gregg Waugh, South Atlantic Fishery Management Council deputy executive director, told the fishermen during a meeting in New Bern about the lowering of king mackerel limits. He also told that the council has set the limit to prevent the overfishing of king mackerel. He also informed that the council’s Science and Statistical Committee could lower the current 10 million pound limit to around 7 million pounds.
Under this limit the commercial quota for the South Atlantic would fall to 2.6 million pounds which is expected to be reached as early as the end of October. Then the harvest will be prohibited until the start of the new fishing season in March, says Waugh. The decision worries North Carolina where landings from November through the winter account for 60 percent of the king mackerel catch in the state.
According to SAFMC there are three new allocation methods that might reduce that disproportionate impact on North Carolina. Majority of fishermen at the New Bern meeting said state-by-state quotas would work best, a position supported by the North Carolina Division of Marine Fisheries. Waugh said the NMFS (National Marine Fisheries Service) has expressed concern that there would be four quotas to be tracked.
But Louis Daniel, director of the North Carolina Division of Marine Fisheries, said quota monitoring is going to be a big issue. He questioned that why only four South Atlantic states would have to monitor the mackerel quota. Waugh said the council is plugging that gap for snapper grouper right now. Commercial fishermen questioned how the data used in the mackerel stock assessment is collected.
