U.S. Senator Dan Sullivan (R-Alaska), a member of the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee, today celebrated the committee’s passage of his Bycatch Reduction Act, comprehensive legislation to reduce bycatch, protect seafloor habitat, and strengthen transparency and accountability in federal fisheries management.
Several fish and crustacean species that spend all or part of their life in the marine environment have been experiencing increased variability in their productivity and abundance. The Bycatch Reduction Act builds on recommendations identified by the Alaska Salmon Task Force, which sought to disentangle environmental and human-caused factors that may be contributing to species declines and survivability, including bycatch in the marine environment. The task force was originally convened as a result of legislation authored by Sen. Sullivan, which was signed into law in December 2022.
“Today is an exciting day for the countless Alaskans—from subsistence harvesters to commercial and recreational fishermen, residents of coastal communities to upriver villages—who’ve rightfully demanded action to reduce mid-water and bottom trawl bycatch and gear contact with the seafloor to better protect our fisheries,” said Sen. Sullivan. “My Senate Commerce Committee colleagues and I passed my legislation that takes a comprehensive approach to these concerns: setting clear standards and strict enforcement measures, improving monitoring, increasing transparency, and helping test and deploy new gear and equipment that reduce bycatch and habitat disturbances. Each of these priorities came from conversations with and input from hundreds of Alaskans, and I can’t thank them enough for their ideas and support. Now, this legislation moves to the Senate floor, taking an important step toward safeguarding the long-term sustainability of the fishery resources so many Alaskans rely upon.”
Sen. Sullivan’s Bycatch Reduction Act creates a robust toolkit to reduce bycatch and seafloor habitat impacts from mid-water and bottom trawl fishing vessels and strengthen reporting transparency and accountability. These tools include establishing clear standards and monitoring requirements to ensure trawl nets remain off the seafloor; mandating proven salmon excluder devices; investing in salmon tagging, faster genetic sampling, and ecosystem analyses; creating a new flume tank testing facility that simulates real ocean conditions to evaluate new gear and tools; and reauthorizing the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) Bycatch Reduction Engineering Program (BREP). Finally, the Bycatch Reduction Act would provide the public with greater access to participate in the North Pacific Fishery Management Council regulatory process and NOAA data monitoring.
Press release provided by the Office of U.S. Senator Dan Sullivan.
