ADVANCEMENT OF MARINE SCIENCES ij9f 



Without these, their answer is, "No." 



Can the ocean supply world needs? 



The answer is the same. 



The nation which has taken the lead in fisheries research and 

 exploration is not the United States. It is Soviet Russia, which 

 since the war has built a huge fleet of large exploratory and research 

 ships, trained hundreds of marine biologists to accompany them, and 

 has constructed the world's largest and most modern fisheries fleet 

 to harvest the fish these scientists find. 



Soviet scientists on Soviet research ships equipped with advanced 

 scientific instruments are exploring the Pacific south of Alaska and the 

 tropical mid-Pacific, and the Atlantic from the Bay of Biscay to Cape 

 Horn and from the African bulge to Brazil. 



Earlier they explored the Grand Banks off Newfoundland, historic 

 fishing grounds of New Englanders, Canadians, Portuguese, French, 

 and English for over 300 years. 



Last year Russian fishermen took 10 pounds of fish there to every 

 pound caught by U.S. fishermen, and more fish than every other 

 nation except Canada, which is adjacent to the fishing grounds. 



In the Bering Sea o^ Alaska, according to testimony at hearings on 

 S. 901, Russia is operating a fleet of 60 to 90 trawlers, 15 to 20 large 

 refrigerator ships, and 3 to 4 factory ships. 



"Our American seafood industry must compete on the high seas 

 with its Soviet counterpart as well as with the fishing industries of 

 many other nations, both friendly and unfriendly to our way of life," 

 Mr. Milton E. Brooding, chairman of the U. S. section of the Inter- 

 national North Pacific Fisheries Commission, testified before the 

 committee at hearings on S. 901. 



Many of these nations are far ahead of ours in the study of 

 oceanography. 



Our lack of knowledge of marine sciences, is, quite frankly, 

 appalling. If we can learn more about the effects of various 

 natural phenomena upon fish movements ; we can reduce the 

 time required for the catch, and, thereby, reduce signifi- 

 cantly our costs of production. The lower the cost per ton 

 of production by our fishermen, the lower will be the cost 

 per can of fish to the housewife. 



The U.S. fisheries research fleet is small, overage, obsolete, and has 

 been shrinking instead of gaining during the past 3 years. 



Witnesses at hearings on S. 901 were caustic about the decline in 

 U.S. facilities for fisheries research. 



Dr. Wilbert M. Chapman, who has held high Government, State 

 and university posts and is now Director of the Resources Committee 

 of San Diego, Calif., testified that the Nation's research fleet is now 

 in a worse condition than it was 5 years ago. He stated: 



We had two research vessels working in the Gulf of Mexico. 

 Now we have one working off the vState of California. The 

 reason for this is that the bottom fell out of our (California) 

 research ship. We just couldn't fix it up. So the Bureau 

 of Commercial Fisheries * * * were kind enough to loan 

 one of those vessels to the State of California. That leaves 

 you (Florida) one short. 



