Fraser River Sockeye Fisheries and Fisheries Management - Cohen ...

Bristol Bay was in 1997 when there were 9.9 million fish caught. Fewer dramaticallylow harvests in the Bay likely translate into less controversy, fear, and politicizing of thefishery management regime than occurs on the Fraser River.Variability in Returns and Escapement GoalsThe two fisheries differ in how much their annual returns fluctuate from year to year. Aconvenient index of variability in annual returns across years is the coefficient ofvariation (CV), which is simply the standard deviation of the annual returns for a series ofyears divided by the mean for those years (and expressed as a percent). The CVs forFraser and Bristol Bay returns from 1980 to 2009 reveal that Fraser sockeye returns havefluctuated about twice as much on an annual basis as the Bristol Bay returns during thistime period (Fraser CV= 68% versus Bay CV= 32%; Appendix L).The high variability in returns and uncertainty associated with optimum escapement goalsfor Fraser sockeye have resulted in managers and fishers selecting more complexabundance related harvest rules to set management goals for Fraser sockeye. These rulesallow for more harvesting when run sizes are small, and more conservative harvest rateswhen run sizes are large, than would be permitted under a fixed escapement goalapproach similar to that used for Bristol Bay sockeye. The more complex harvest rulesand management goals come with added challenges, including the task of communicatingfishing plans to the fishers.The clarity and priority associated with the Bristol Bay escapement goals is very differentfrom the Fraser harvest rate management approach and has provided Bristol Baymanagers with greater ability to control fisheries and achieve the escapement goals. Aclearly defined set of escapement goals for Fraser sockeye would not guarantee successbut is one way that the management of Fraser sockeye stocks could be made simpler andincrease the potential for achieving these escapement goals. If this approach was adoptedfor the Fraser it is unlikely that escapement goals would be constant across all cycle yearsfor clearly cyclic stocks (e.g., late-Shuswap and Quesnel) but the goals would probablybe similar across all years for non-cyclic stocks. These goals would be much easier thecommunicate to fishers than the current complex Total Allowable Mortality (TAM) rulesand still allow managers the latitude to the implementation of harvest rate ceilings toprotect less productive stocks when returns of the target stocks are large.165