The Scientific and Statistical Committee (SSC) of the Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council has recommended a phased in acceptable biological catch limit for bottom fish in American Samoa.
To address overfishing in the American Samoa bottomfish fishery, the SSC recommended a 5,000 pounds limit in fishing year 2021 and 2000 pounds in fishing year 2022. This option provides a gradual reduction in the Acceptable Biological Catch and allows limited access to offshore banks to access culturally important deep-water snappers.
To rebuild the overfished American Samoa bottomfish stock within the next 10 years per the Magnuson-Stevens Act (MSA), the SSC supports an annual catch limit (ACL) of 1,500 pounds. An in-season accountability measure will be implemented to track the catch relative to the ACL. Federal waters will close to bottomfishing when the annual catch limit is projected to be reached.
SSC members discussed the practicality of enforcing fishing regulations between territorial and federal waters. The distribution of bottomfish using a habitat proxy showed 85% is found in territorial waters. The reduction of catch through this federal action only constitutes a minute portion of the total catch, but a significant proportion of the deep-water bottomfish species found on the offshore banks.
The committee expressed concerns regarding the data-limited nature of these fisheries that hampers their accurate representation and the ability to properly manage them. The COVID-19 pandemic affected implementing the data collection programs. The SSC noted that if there is no new data to support the new benchmark assessment aside from changing the modeling approach, then the fishery may still end up with the same stock status.
It reiterated its recommendation that the next benchmark bottomfish stock assessment in 2023 analyze the deep-water complex separately from the shallow-water complex. The SSC also recommended that the Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center conduct a data workshop with the American Samoa bottomfish fishermen, local fishery agency and other interested parties to discuss the data and model assumptions that will be used in the next assessment.
Recommendations made by the SSC on these and other matters will be considered by the Council when it meets Dec. 2-4, 2020, virtually .
