29 



Mr. Anderson. I do. 



The Chairman. Thank you very much. 



STATEMENT OF NELS A. ANDERSON, JR., EXECUTIVE 

 DIRECTOR, BRISTOL BAY ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT CORP. 



Mr. Anderson. Mr. Chairman, my name is Nels A. Anderson, 

 Jr., for the record, and I am the executive director of the Bristol 

 Bay Economic Development Corp., and I have lived in Bristol Bay 

 all of my life. 



There are three areas on which I would like to focus my testi- 

 mony: conservation, the continuation of the community develop- 

 ment quota program, and the membership makeup of the North 

 Pacific Fisheries Management Council. 



First, conservation of our resources has been concern of our peo- 

 ple along the coast of the Bering Sea for many years. What hap- 

 pens in the Federal waters of the Bering Sea affects all of our peo- 

 ple who rely on the fish and marine resources found there. Our 

 people rely on salmon and herring for our subsistence and commer- 

 cial fishing needs. It is imperative for us to stress the need to re- 

 duce waste on the high seas by keeping bycatch levels to an abso- 

 lute minimum, by imposing strict enforceable incentives and by 

 creating the best monitoring programs that we can devise. In the 

 interest of conservation, BBEDC, along with their partner 

 Oceantrawl, supports two observers on each trawl vessel, volu- 

 metric bin measurement and caps on bycatch of salmon. And they 

 may not agree with this one, but we support caps on bycatch of 

 salmon throughout the Bering Sea fishery. 



Second, based on our experience, the CDQ program is proving to 

 be a tremendous success. Our CDQ corporation has adopted a very 

 cautious approach to the use of revenue gained through the CDQ 

 program. We are investing our funds in human resource develop- 

 ment by initiating vocational and technical training programs, a 

 scholarship program and a plan to protect our salmon fishery by 

 keeping limited entry permits in Bristol Bay. For these reasons, we 

 need to have a CDQ program placed in the Magnuson Act so that 

 we can have a long-term source of revenue to support these plans 

 to help our people. 



Our Oceantrawl partner — our partner Oceantrawl Inc. has hired 

 50 of our people on their trawlers to date and we are rapidly ap- 

 proaching our goal of 60. In addition, Oceantrawl and BBEDC are 

 working on an internship program that would be designed to give 

 our people business office training. BBEDC and Oceantrawl are 

 working on setting up an Alaska seafood investment fund that 

 would be used to invest in fishery-related ventures. Revenue gained 

 from this activity would support our training and scholarship pro- 

 grams. 



We would also like to see the CDQ program expanded to include 

 all species in the Bering Sea so that our CDQ groups are not de- 

 pendent on the single pollock fishery. For these reasons, the CDQ 

 program should be included as a part of the Magnuson Act during 

 debate on reauthorization. 



Finally, we would like to see the status quo maintained on the 

 membership of the North Pacific Fishery Management Council. By 

 and large, the council has been responsive to western Alaska and 



