68 



By your leave, I would also like to address several 

 additional concerns which reflect that there is no silver bullet 

 solution to the problems of our fisheries. It is a solution with 

 many parts. Let me share my sense of some of them with you. 



A critical first component is more transitional federal grant 

 aid, targetted to benefit entrepreneurs and fishermen rather then 

 savvy grantswriters — we preserve an industry and create jobs by 

 creating investment pools to modernize shoreside equipment 

 and facilities and by retrofitting vessels for entry into the 

 sustainable harvesting of abundant but underutilized species. 



Second, market development assistance is critically needed. 

 For example, mackerel and herring stocks are strong, but 

 domestic markets are not. Federal procurement and foreign aid 

 programs could pick up the slack while those markets are being 

 built. 



Third, wastewater treatment considerations continue to 

 hamper value-added fish processing -- fully 75% of the jobs 

 which the fishing industry could produce are in processing, 

 packaging, and marketing. But Clean Water Act discharge 

 standards and the costs of pretreatment cripple the growth of this 

 source of jobs. 



The same federal government which mandates these 

 pretreatment requirements must provide funding assistance to 

 meet them, just as critically-needed Clean Water Act 

 re-authorization should provide desperately-needed regulatory 

 relief. 



