Alaska/Pacific Coast Fish and Game predicts larger salmon harvest compared to 2018 KBBI by Aaron Bolton - April 30, 2019 With the start of the salmon season just a few weeks away, Alaska’s fishing industry is hoping the Alaska Department of Fish and Game’s pre-season forecast holds true for much of the state. The department is predicting a solid season for many of Alaska’s salmon fisheries. https://www.kbbi.org/post/fish-and-game-predicts-larger-salmon-harvest-compared-2018 Togiak purse seine fishery could break harvest record for gear type According to ADF&G, the hefty purse seine harvest is due to a recent change in gear type allocation. That change shifted an additional 10 percent of the quota to the purse seine fleet. KDLG by Isabelle Ross - April 30, 2019 This year’s purse seine harvest for the Togiak sac roe herring fishery is projected to break the record for that gear type's largest harvest. The purse seine fishery closed for the season on Friday. The initial harvest is 23,060 tons – just over the previous record of 22,853 tons set in 1994. https://www.kdlg.org/post/togiak-purse-seine-fishery-could-break-harvest-record-gear-type#stream/0 National Names Rubino Senior Advisor for Seafood Strategy NOAA Fisheries - April 29, 2019 Today, NOAA Fisheries announced the appointment of Dr. Michael Rubino as the agency’s new Senior Advisor for Seafood Strategy. In this new role, he will lead the development of markets for U.S. fisheries products and facilitate new and expanded domestic aquaculture production. https://www.fisheries.noaa.gov/feature-story/noaa-names-rubino-senior-advisor-seafood-strategy International Russia Expects Sea of Okhotsk Pollock to Decline in Coming Years SeafoodNews.com by Eugene Gerden - April 26, 2019 Russia may face a decline of pollock catch in the sea of Okhotsk, which is the center of pollock production in the country after 2020-2021, according to recent statements of some leading Russian experts and senior officials of the Russian Ministry of Agriculture. According to recent statements of experts from TINRO (Russian Pacific Research Institute of Fisheries and Oceanography), by 2022 Russia may face a decline of the total allowable catch of pollock at least in the Sea of Okhotsk. This is due to the lack of good recruitment since 2014. This, according to scientists’ predictions, will probably lead to the decline of a total number and biomass of pollock in the Sea of Okhotsk. In this regard, particular attention will be paid to the development of pollock populations in other areas, especially the Eastern Bering Sea and the East Kamchatka area. As part of this, there are plans to increase pollock catch in the East-Bering Sea zone (the current volume of catch varies in the range of 350,000-400,000 tons) and the East Kamchatka area (200,000 tons) and the South Kuril area. As for South Kuril zone, during the Soviet times at the end of the 1980s, the annual catch of Soviet fishermen in this area was in the range of 350,000-400,000 tons, however, nowadays these figures do not exceed 80,000-100,000 tonnes per year. According to scientists, probably the most complex situation is currently observed in the case of Russia’s Primorye pollock, particularly those, which live in the waters of the Sea of Japan, and which population, according to scientists, for the last several years has significantly declined. In recent years, pollock reserves in this area have declined by almost 15 times from 150,000-200,000 tons at the beginning of the 2000s to only 10,000-18,000 tons at present. The Russians do not give reasons for the decline, except for possible overfishing in the South Kurile Zone. However, if the trends are similar to elsewhere in the Pacific, the pollock are moving north as waters warm. https://www.seafoodnews.com/Story/1139534/Russia-Expects-Sea-of-Okhotsk-Pollock-to-Decline-in-Coming-Years FYI’s Alaskan halibut, caught by a century-old Seattle boat, provides a glimpse of Amazon’s strategy with Whole Foods The Seattle Times by Benjamin Romano - April 28, 2019 From the deck of his 106-year-old halibut schooner, undergoing a seasonal overhaul at Fisherman’s Terminal in Seattle, skipper Wade Bassi has better insight than most into what’s happening at Amazon-owned Whole Foods Market, at least as pertains to the product he knows best. https://www.savingseafood.org/news/economic-impact/alaskan-halibut-caught-by-a-century-old-seattle-boat-provides-a-glimpse-of-amazons-strategy-with-whole-foods/
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