45 



the supply of fish in Georges Bank and the Gulf of Maine caused 

 primarily by overfishing and closures of these areas by the 

 National Marine Fisheries Service. 



Our request for a natural disaster declaration and assistance 

 by FEMA and SBA acknowledges fishing mortality is important and 

 must be controlled. Massachusetts has played a lead role in 

 helping to develop new federal fishing regulations to rebuild cod, 

 haddock, and yellowtail flounders. 



The New England Fishery Management Council, of which 

 Massachusetts is a leading participant, as part of its recovery 

 program, hopes to rebuild groundfish abundance by further 

 tightening regulations. There are timetables for fisheries closures 

 and strategies for additional restrictions if rebuilding doesn't 

 occur as anticipated, and it might not if natural factors continue 

 to promote poor recruitment . These timetables and strategies are 

 part of Amendment #7 to the Council's Multispecies Plan that was 

 just implemented July 1. 



Natural factors have played a major role in the collapse and 

 will seriously hinder a fisheries recovery even if fishing 

 mortality is reduced to zero. We have demonstrated that the 

 potential for critical, improved recruitment — defined as good 

 production of young fish, or year-classes, on which the future of 

 the fisheries depends — is low due to natural factors. These 

 factors have created a disaster for Massachusetts' groundfish 

 fishing industry. 



The SBA denial is particularly puzzling in light of the fact 

 that the Commerce Secretary in 1995 (as part of declaring a fishery- 

 resource disaster) declared the "damaged condition of fishery- 

 resources beyond the control of individual fishermen" and 

 recognized "the disappearance of periodic strong year-classes that 

 have long sustained a healthy commercial fishery" . 



Even the December denial of FEMA assistance by Director Jamie 

 Witt recognized that "a combination of natural factors", including 

 predation, competition and general warming trend in water 

 temperature "aggravated" the decline of groundfish stocks in the 

 Georges Bank and the Gulf of Maine . 



There is an issue of consistency in the denials of 

 Massachusetts' requests. The federal government was willing in 1994 

 to declare a natural disaster on the West Coast fisheries, based on 

 "El Nino" . 



Our point is that if the logic for a natural disaster 

 declaration is appropriate for the west coast and salmon, then it 

 should be just as appropriate for New England and especially 



