47 



The combined 1993 offshore allocations of about 789,000 metric 

 tons were 30 percent of the total resource. That is a resource that 

 is fundamentally allocated to the offshore sector, Alaska, and 

 under the council's action for the west coast on whiting. 



Secretary Brown's reversal of the council's whiting allocation re- 

 sulted in a mere 8-percent increase for offshore interests, but re- 

 quired Pacific coast shoreside interests to forfeit 60 percent of what 

 had been allocated to them. 



Of greater importance on these charts is the comparison of off- 

 shore and onshore shares in Alaska and the west coast. In the Gulf 

 of Alaska, with the small fishery-dependent communities, much 

 like the coastal communities of Southern Washington, Oregon, and 

 Northern California, onshore shares are 90 to 100 percent of the re- 

 source. 



In the Bering Sea and the Aleutian Islands, the offshore sector 

 dominates. Under the council's whiting decision, a sliding scale 

 would have been a dynamic and fair approach which advances 

 shoreside when stocks are low and uses the offshore sector's mobili- 

 ty when stocks are high. 



In my chart, I show you how that percentage can vary. In the 

 council's allocation, this offshore sector under the 1993 allowable 

 harvest would have gotten 26 percent of the resource. The shore- 

 side sector would have gotten 74 percent of the resource. 



Under attack of 200,000 metric tons, those percentages would 

 have risen to 37.5 percent for the offshore and fallen to 62.5 per- 

 cent for the onshore sector. The nature of the sliding scale was that 

 the resource availability increased. The offshore sector got more of 

 the increase. 



That takes advantage of their mobility and doesn't cause over- 

 capitalization at the local level. Conversely, at low stock-sizes, 

 there is a floor, a protection level, for the shoreside sector. You 

 have heard testimony about how whiting is expected in the future 

 to particularly fit more closely into the total available resource. 



Another thing I want to have you examine — I didn't include it as 

 attachments, but I provided the references — I believe your staff 

 should spend serious time comparing the final rulemaking in the 

 offshore /onshore allocations for the Gulf of Alaska Plan Amend- 

 ment 23, approved by the North Pacific Council, and the regula- 

 tions, the final rulemaking of Commerce on this whiting allocation 

 decision. I think examination of those two rules will find that there 

 is inconsistent approaches being taken by the Federal agency. 



The final attachment I have is information that came from the 

 input/output model result considered by the council as part of its 

 whiting decision. During the council's process, offshore interests 

 emphasized a point — and Mr. Blum repeated this point today — that 

 the employment of Oregon citizens on factory trawlers would be 

 impacted by the allocation decision. 



The input/output model showed the difference in lost income be- 

 tween the council's preferred alternative. The best offshore alterna- 

 tive was $108,000 for Oregon. 



The Governor's office was apprised of these losses and, in the 

 face of that, still made the policy decision that stability for coastal 

 communities was important. 



