Hawaii FEP - Western Pacific Fishery Council

CHAPTER 5: HAWAII ARCHIPELAGO FISHERY ECOSYSTEM PLANMANAGEMENT PROGRAM5.1 IntroductionThis chapter describes the Council’s existing management program for bottomfish, crustaceans,precious corals, and coral reef ecosystem fisheries of the Hawaii Archipelago as well as thecriteria used to assess the status of managed species. Existing management measures includeNWHI federal permit, reporting and observer requirements as well as limited entry programs,vessel size limits, harvest guidelines, quotas, minimum size limits and gear restrictions tomonitor and control NWHI harvests of bottomfish, lobsters and precious corals. There are noMSA management measures for NWHI coral reef ecosystem fisheries as the inclusion of thisarea in the Coral Reef Ecosystems FMP was disapproved by NMFS.MHI management measures include federal permitting and reporting requirements to providedata on harvests of precious corals and certain coral reef ecosystem species. In addition the MHIprecious corals fishery is subject to gear restrictions, quotas and minimum size limits. The MHIlobster fishery is subject to seasonal closures as well as minimum size and gear restrictions.Further, all federal fisheries are subject to control rules which allow evaluation of whether stocksare being overfished. If any stocks are determined by NMFS to be overfished (or subject tooverfishing) Councils and the agency now have two years from the notice of overfishing toprepare and implement plans to end overfishing and rebuild pursuant to the reauthorized MSA.For more information on these measures please see the Council’s FMPs and amendments asthose documents contain complete discussions of the need for and analysis of each measurediscussed here. All existing measures and pending recommendations were developed, analyzedand transmitted to NMFS in accordance with the MSA in response to changing fishery orenvironmental conditions. In this manner federal fisheries around Hawaii have been and willcontinue to be adaptively managed under the MSA using a precautionary approach which rejectsa lack of information as a basis for inaction.The 2003 administrative and enforcement costs of conserving and managing the domesticfisheries of the Western Pacific Region were estimated by NMFS and the Council to total $37million, with future annual costs predicted to be $74 million (NOAA and WPRFMC 2004).5.2 Description of National Standard 1 Guidelines on OverfishingOverfishing occurs when fishing mortality (F) is higher than the level at which fishing producesmaximum sustainable yield (MSY). MSY is the maximum long-term average yield that can beproduced by a stock on a continuing basis. A stock is overfished when stock biomass (B) hasfallen to a level substantially below what is necessary to produce MSY. So there are two aspectsthat managers must monitor to determine the status of a fishery: the level of F in relation to F atMSY (F MSY ), and the level of B in relation to B at MSY (B MSY ).133