NMFS Administrator Disputes Governor’s Claims

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The Regional Administrator for the National Marine Fisheries Service in Hawaii says the agency disagreed with Governor Lolo and small vessel or alia fishermen in their arguments against relaxing American Samoa’s Large Vessel Prohibited Area.

KHJ News Washington Correspondent Matt Kaye reports.

Michael Tosatto says Governor Lolo Moliga argued the final rule last week to allow local longline vessels to fish with 12-miles of shore, is “inconsistent with the Deeds of Succession” that provides American Samoa with some control over its marine resources.

But Tosatto disagrees.

145 Tosatto “Clearly, the action we are taking isconsistent with the federal authorities, provided by the Magnuson-StevensFisheries Conservation Management Act. We believe that the Governor’s letter overstates the territory’s authorities…and don’t agree that this action is outside of our authority.” :25

As for claims by small vessel fishermen that the rule will inhibit small fisheries or produce undue competition–

225 Tosatto “We again, disagreed with. We think…and continue to support….the development of small vessel fisheries, both in the non-commercial and commercial sectors…and do see a balance between these two.” :18

Tosatto insists the new rule, quoting,“will not impact access to those resources, by those smaller fisheries.”

Tosatto said in November, when the Fisheries Service was still considering its rule to relax the Large Vessel Prohibited Area restrictions, his agency did not feel the impact on the resource or the conflict for gear, “would be significant.”

He said the Fisheries Service had seen just one or two small longline vessels, the prohibited area was intended to help.

But Tosatto says the large commercial vessels are facing the economic challenge of lower prices for their catch and an uptick in fuel and operating costs, which played a key role he suggests in his agency’s rulemaking.

The Fisheries Service received close to 300-comments, the bulk of them from American Samoa.

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