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Research priorities
New England Fishery Management Council
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The New England Fishery Management Council (NEFMC) established a Research Steering Committee (RSC) in 1999 to better integrate management information needs with research efforts and to foster the participation of fishermen in collaborative fisheries science. By appointing Council members, fishermen and scientists to the RSC, the Council sought to improve New England fisheries management through the development of research strategies that incorporate stakeholders and fulfill the information needs of decision-makers. To that end, the RSC identified and prioritized areas of research in 2000 and again in 2001 and will coordinate with other agencies and organizations to promote the Council's research goals.
The information needs of all the fishery management plans within the NEFMC jurisdiction are being considered as part of the RSC planning agenda (please see Research Priorities by Species). Recent RFPs have focused on sea scallops and the groundfish complex.
Level I Priorities
Level II Priorities
Level III Priorities
Projects Funded in 2000
2001 RFP
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Management Data Priorities
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In January 2001, the NEFMC approved three long-term programs --- an industry-based survey/ study fleet capability, a comprehensive tagging program to study cod stock structure, and conservation engineering (gear design to effect impacts on bycatch and habitat) --- as its highest priority research areas for groundfish and related fisheries. Implementation of each of these programs is being considered as part of an overarching regional research strategy involving fishermen, and local, state and federal science institutions. Scoping and development planning of these program areas is currently underway. (See list of projects funded in 2000 below).
Additionally, the NEFMC has approved a list of specific research needs that may be addressed in projects with more short-term funding streams. This list will be reviewed and revised periodically. Though the list is organized in three tiers (with Level I being of most immediate need), all the identified areas are of great importance to the Council's planning:
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NEFMC, Level I Priorities
- Obtain better fine-scale information on resource status in inshore areas.
- Provide enhanced port and sea sampling information using the fishing industry (including documenting the quantity and composition of discards).
- Monitor and evaluate effectiveness of area closures as a management tool to protect and rebuild stocks.
- Evaluate discard, bycatch and non-catch mortality rates - initiate special studies under experimental design protocols to calculate gear interaction or discard rates.
- Develop methods of enhanced collection of biological data through fishery participants.
NEFMC, Level II Priorities
- Obtain life history and spawning information: identify time and areas of spawning as well as other life history information as determined from fishing activities and information collected from the fishing industry (for example, through the Delphi method or some other analytical or consensus-based procedure)
- Fishing power, catchability and capacity
- Investigate the conditions and benthos (ocean bottom types) that contribute to post-settlement groundfish survivability. Identify the major groundfish nursery areas and their characteristics.
- Conduct fishing industry-supported high-resolution sediment mapping in specific areas of the Gulf of Maine and/or Georges Bank and identify biological communities associated with mapped areas. Determine any relationship between sediment types and biological communities
- Identify and compare/contrast impacts to a variety of habitat types (mud, sand, gravel, cobble, rock, boulder) associated with roller and rockhopper trawl gear of the various sizes used in New England fisheries.
- Households and Communities - including but not limited to research on family involvement independence on fishing; measures of community dependence on fishing; changes in dependence across time and space; crew issues such as working conditions, safety and views of the future; spatial considerations such as where people fish and why; the kinds of communities and social relations connected with fishing ways of life and broad issues of area and/or sector-based management and community impacts.
- Fishing Practices - research into how to integrate fishermen's knowledge into fisheries management; fishing business practices including surveys which examine numbers of fisheries participated in, annual rounds of fisheries, training needs, etc.
- Management and Enforcement Issues - research on compliance, at sea and at shore enforcement, improving the effectiveness of regulations, etc.
- Institutions for the Future - including issues of capacity management, capacity reduction, increased permit flexibility; alternative organizations for management such as large marine ecosystems, co-management, zones, coops, and forms of community-based management; research into effective administration, implementation and design of ITQ and other rights-based forms of management.
NEFMC, Level III Priorities
- Improve our understanding of predator/prey interactions and examine food habits through stomach content analysis, stable isotopes, otolith analysis or other reliable method.
- Evaluate the use of Marine Protected Areas.
- Develop methods to collect and/or integrate ecosystem information into fisheries management decision-making.
- Examine and compare the critical life history processes of commercially important species in a variety of habitats (which have been identified through fine-scale mapping) in both heavily and lightly fished reference areas.
- Develop and demonstrate the practical use of otter trawl, scallop dredge and other fishing gear designs that have significantly less contact or impact on the benthos than gear in current use by New England fishermen.
- Identify areas in the Gulf of Maine and Georges Bank that have not been subject to fishing activity, focusing primarily on areas with high relief geologic structure (e.g. boulder piles, areas in close proximity to wrecks, or other areas that have been left undisturbed). Identify flora and fauna that will allow a determination that areas have not been towed or fished.
- Determine expenditure impacts on the fishing industry in New England - including surveys of locations of expenditures, localized input/output analyses, etc., for socio-economic impact analysis.
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Projects Funded in 2000
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With the Council's RSC serving as NMFS's evaluation team on research proposals, the following projects were funded through NMFS's 2000 RFP: A total of $2,110,443 was awarded to projects involving collaborative research efforts.
- The University of Massachusetts/Dartmouth, to conduct a high-resolution fishery resource survey. The University's School for Marine Science and Technology (SMAST) will work with at least 23 trawlers from the New Bedford area to obtain information about fish distribution on a tow by tow basis. Members of the Trawler Survival Fund will provide information to SMAST on their catches in 5000 tows. The purpose is to provide a finer scale picture of fish distribution and abundance in areas southeast of Cape Cod and to improve our understanding of Catch per Unit Effort (cost: up to $570,090)
- The Boat Kathleen Mirarchi, Inc, to study the effects of trawl gear on soft bottom in Cape Cod Bay. The project will assess the effects of trawl gear, including doors, cables and nets on the animal communities living in and on the ocean floor and will study the short-term impacts of trawling on the characteristics of the sediment and water column (cost: up to $150,990).
- The Undersea Research Foundation, Inc. of Tom's River, NJ to study the correlation between whiting abundance and bottom water temperatures in the mid-Atlantic Bight. The project will also investigate stock structure of whiting in the Gulf of Maine, Georges Bank and the mid-Atlantic Bight using genetic techniques (cost: up to $79,920).
- The Maine Department of Marine Resources, to develop a whiting fishery in the Gulf of Maine that meets conservation goals for size selectivity and bycatch. The project will test 2-1/2 inch diamond mesh and 2-1/4 inch square mesh with a 50 mm bar space grate in combination with a raised footrope net configuration to determine whether bycatch reduction targets can be met. It will also produce video footage of the interaction between the gear and fish and the gear and the ocean bottom. (cost: up to $181,900).
- The Maine Department of Marine Resources, to conduct inshore trawl surveys in the Gulf of Maine. This project continues a pilot program initiated through a grant by the Northeast Consortium. Under this contract, there will be seven surveys conducted. There will be a survey in the spring and in the fall, and five surveys sampling four stations along each of six transects from Cape Ann to Frenchmen Bay during other months of the year. Maine DMR will work with the Lobster Zone Management Councils to minimize gear conflicts. (cost: up to $503,300).
- The Massachusetts Institute of Technology/Sea Grant, to identify and evaluate existing data logging and reporting devices. The project will test different designs of electronic reporting devices in a small number of inshore and offshore trawlers, gillnetters and longliners. The contractor will also provide advice on how to integrate these or similar devices into a groundfish study fleet. (cost: up to $137,000).
- The Maine Department of Marine Resources to test bycatch in an observer-based experimental shrimp fishery in an area of relatively higher groundfish concentration than is in currently allowed in the northern shrimp fishery. The goal of the project is to determine whether a shrimp fishery can be conducted southeast of the Loran 25600 line and still remain within acceptable groundfish bycatch limits. Specifically, the project will test the effectiveness of the Nordmore grate in this area of higher groundfish concentrations. (cost: up to $152,334).
- The University of Massachusetts/Dartmouth, to test mesh shapes and excluder devices to reduce bycatch in the multispecies fishery. The project will test the selectivity of square, diamond and hexagonal mesh at two sizes -- 6 inch and 6.5 inch. It will also investigate the effect of grates of different bar spacing (3 inch and 4 inch) on species selectivity. (cost: up to $122,700).
- *The New England Aquarium, to convene a task force of fishermen and scientists who will develop a comprehensive plan for a major cod-tagging program in the Gulf of Maine and Georges Bank. The Aquarium will hold a series of town meetings in Maine, Massachusetts, and Rhode Island to get local fishermen's advice on what a cod-tagging program should entail. A detailed plan is expected by April (cost: up to $110,000).
- *The Manomet Center for Conservation Sciences, to conduct a series of scoping meetings to discuss bycatch reduction techniques with fishermen. The contract calls for convening 10 meetings, which will be held in or near Stonington, CT, Point Judith, RI, New Bedford, MA, Cape Cod, Scituate, MA, Gloucester, MA, Portsmouth, NH, Portland, ME, Port Clyde, ME and Ellsworth, ME. The meetings will be held close to the docks and will be held either in the afternoon or evening (cost: up to $76,750).
Additionally, NMFS issued a sole-source contract based on the research planning strategies being undertaken by the RSC: The Gulf of Maine Aquarium, to conduct scoping meetings to gather information concerning Industry-based surveys, Study fleets and related monitoring efforts which use fishing vessels as fishery data-gathering platforms. A report and recommendations from these meetings will be supplied to the RSC and NMFS for planning purposes.
*Projects related to long-term program development.
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