Response to the Philadelphia Inquirer (they ran Weiss' LA Times article verbatim on Sunday). The Inquirer has a 300 word limit on letters to the editor, which I couldn't come close to, so I asked that they run this as an op-ed piece. Will also send a copy to the LA Times.

Nils

The article on the National Research Council's report on the effects of ocean trawling and dredging written by Los Angeles Times reporter Andrew Weiss (Ocean-floor trawling is criticized, 03/24/02) glosses over just about all of a thorough analysis of a complex and little understood issue for yet another opportunity to contribute to the "doom and gloom" predictions that are filling the coffers of that segment of the environmental industry that has focused on the oceans.

Trawling and dredging are techniques that have been in use for generations for harvesting fish and shellfish that live on or near the seafloor. Well over half of the total harvest of New Jersey's commercial fishermen, which is valued at about 110 million dollars a year, is harvested by dredges or trawls, as is perhaps a third of the total U.S. harvest. Trawls and dredges have been in use in the same areas of ocean for the same species for generations. Today's fishermen often make the same tows that their fathers made decades ago, and the reason they make them is that the fish are still there and can still be caught. Neither trawling nor dredging turns the seafloor into anything approaching a non-productive "desert." In fact, in the sandy areas that make up over 90% of the seafloor off the Mid-Atlantic states, impacts of mobile fishing gear on the bottom are insignificant when compared to those of the nor'easters that assault our coastlines several times each winter.

Mr. Weiss makes much of disquieting phrases like "clear-cutting the ocean" and "devastating effects of mobile fishing gear," while he makes no attempt to put these effects into any kind of real-world context. Suppose that two or three centuries back our farmers were barred from employing any technology that disturbed the "natural" habitat? Were that the case, today we'd be without our agriculture industry; an industry that the rest of the world envies, that handsomely feeds almost 300 million Americans, and that provides us with billions of dollars in export revenues each year. (And I might point out that, rhetoric like that used by Mr. Weiss to the contrary, clear-cutting has been and continues to be an environmentally acceptable practice in use in sustainable logging operations worldwide).

From coast to coast, commercial fishermen have supported and continue to support efforts to identify and protect critical ocean areas from destructive actions, whether those actions are caused by commercial fishing or by other human activities. However, should we also be considering arbitrary and unnecessary restrictions on what we can harvest from the remainder of the 70% of our planet that's covered by oceans? Should we adopt a public policy that universally bans the use of time proven fishing gear simply because it modifies seafloor habitat? Or should we, as the National Research Council report actually suggests, expand our ability to identify those specific areas that need protection from particular types of gear, take the necessary steps to protect them, and continue to refine the gear we 're using to minimize it's impacts?

Mr. Weiss goes on to write "the commercial fishing industry opposes the idea (of a ban on trawl/dredge gear), as well as any other restrictions that would cut into the supply of seafood for American consumers." Of course the commercial fishing industry is opposed to arbitrarily banning these or any other methods of fishing that have been in use for as long as trawls and dredges have, that allow us to provide affordable seafood to U.S. consumers, and that demonstrably allow us to do this in a sustainable manner year after year. As far as his charge that we oppose "any other restrictions," this seems nothing more than a clever way to trivialize opposition to such arbitrary actions. Anyone at all familiar with the fisheries management process knows that for the last two decades commercial fishermen have been working hand-in-hand with fisheries managers to end destructive and/or wasteful fishing practices. Fishermen routinely support and adhere to regulations controlling how, when and where every economically important species can be harvested, but those regulations must be based on sound science.

Like so many others involving the wise and continued use of our natural resources, this is an exceedingly complex issue with at least two sides. Mr. Weiss did an admirable job of representing one of those sides, of misrepresenting another, and of ignoring all of an almost 200 page report because it didn't fit the alarmist tone of his article. It's unfortunate that the Inquirer presented only half of a story that's critically important to thousands of working commercial fishermen, tens of thousands of people in the seafood industry, and millions of seafood consumers. Commercial fishermen in New Jersey and every other state with a commercial fishery are heavily involved in fisheries management, fisheries research and fisheries conservation. Their input was sought by the National Research Council in preparing the report and should play much more of a part in any ensuing dialogue than Mr. Weiss is willing to permit.