Fishery Management Plans

Comprehensive plans detailing the strategies and regulations for managing specific fishery resources, aimed at ensuring their sustainability and productivity.

  • The goal of Amendment 1 is to manage the northern shrimp fishery in a manner that is biologically, economically, and socially sound, while protecting the resource, its users, and opportunities for participation by all stakeholders.

  • This addendum allows for specification of TALs for the summer flounder, scup, and/or black sea bass fisheries in any given year for up to three years. This allows for fishermen to better utilize the quota to meet their fishing needs from planning fishing days to planning the time to service boats. Multi-year specifications also allow fishermen to establish strong business plans that are effective in meeting their goals. Multi-year specifications also streamline the administrative processes involved in specifying TALs for the summer flounder, scup, and black sea bass fisheries.

  • Several new findings have surfaced since the Board first took management action in 1998 and again in 2000 and 2001. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s (USFWS) Shorebird Technical Committee completed its report to the Management Board in June 2003, which included conclusions and recommendations for management and research. At its May 2003 meeting, the Horseshoe Crab Technical Committee recognized the need for change to the reporting requirements for biomedical companies and states. It also identified outdated state monitoring requirements and research needs in the FMP.

  • This addendum proposes a management system that will constrain the recreational scup fishery to the coastwide recreational harvest limit; and allow states to customize scup recreational management measures in order to deal with burden issues associated with the implementation of coastwide measures. It also proposes a management process that minimizes the administrative burden when implementing conservation equivalency.