dental take by commercial ‘fisheries. Also, the pro- 
posed regime failed to take into account that the 
biological significance of the removals will depend on 
the age and sex as well as the number of animals 
taken. 
The initial draft regime would have allowed the 
Service to authorize incidental take for indefinite 
periods of time even when there were substantial 
uncertainties concerning the possible adverse effects of 
the take on the affected marine mammal stocks. In 
this context, the Commission pointed out that the 
proposed monitoring programs probably would be 
unable to detect population declines as great as five to 
ten percent per year in less than 10 to 20 years (i.e., 
until the affected populations had been reduced by 50 
percent or more). The Commission therefore recom- 
mended that the length of time that incidental takes 
could be authorized without making formal status-of- 
stocks determinations or verifying that affected 
populations are increasing toward (or being main- 
tained within) their optimum sustainable population 
ranges be limited to three to five years. Without such 
a limit, there would be little incentive to ensure that 
incidental take during commercial fishing operations, 
by itself and in combination with other forms of take, 
does not cause the affected populations to be reduced 
or to be maintained below their maximum net produc- 
tivity levels. 
Under the Service’s draft regime, recovery plans 
and conservation plans could establish allowable 
removal levels less than those calculated using the 
general formula for calculating allowable biological 
removals. The regime, however, did not identify 
those situations when such reductions would be 
appropriate or provide any criteria for making the 
determinations. Noting that such determinations were 
likely to be highly controversial and could impede 
necessary conservation measures, the Commission 
recommended that the Service expand its proposal to 
provide criteria for judging when it would be appro- 
priate for recovery plans and conservation plans to 
establish take levels less than would be authorized 
using the general formula for calculating allowable 
biological removal levels. 
The Draft Legislative Environmental Impact 
Statement that accompanied the Service’s initial 
93 
Chapter IV — Marine Mammal-Fisheries Interactions 
proposal assessed the economic impacts of four 
alternatives using the period before enactment of the 
Marine Mammal Protection Act as a baseline. This 
incorrectly implied that adoption of any of the alterna- 
tives would adversely affect fisheries and benefit 
marine mammals. The Commission pointed out that, 
without additional legislation, the system for authoriz- 
ing the take of marine mammals incidental to com- 
mercial fisheries would revert to that in existence 
prior to enactment of the interim exemption in 1988. 
The Commission therefore recommended that the 
economic analyses be redone using the statutory 
provisions in effect prior to enactment of the interim 
exemption as the baseline. Such analyses would show 
that three of the four alternatives, including the 
Service’s proposal and the Commission’s recommend- 
ed guidelines, would benefit fisheries to various 
degrees, at the expense of marine mammals. 
In addition, the Commission recommended that: 
e the term “allowable biological removal” be 
changed to clarify that it represents the maximum 
number of animals that might be taken from a 
population with confidence that the removals would 
not cause the population to be reduced or to be 
maintained below its maximum net productivity 
level; 
¢ the proposed regime be revised to include a 
Streamlined procedure for authorizing “small 
takes” of marine mammals in fisheries that have 
few interactions similar to that for non-fisheries 
activities provided in section 101(a)(5) of the 
Marine Mammal Protection Act; 
¢ the Service establish a threshold below which no 
incidental taking from severely depleted popula- 
tions could be authorized unless it were reasonably 
demonstrated that the population is increasing at or 
near its maximum growth rate and the authorized 
level of take would not significantly reduce the 
recovery rate; 
e the Service review its determinations concerning 
“uncontrollable” takes and revise its approach for 
allocating allowable biological removals so that 
each requested authorization would be judged on 
its Own merits, taking into account (1) other forms 
