Groups challenge sustainable resource certification of Maine lobster fishery, site right whales

The Pure Sources Protection Council and different conservation teams are difficult a seafood watchdog’s recertification of the Gulf of Maine lobster fishery as a sustainable useful resource.

The Gulf of Maine’s lobster fishery first obtained the Maine Stewardship Council’s sustainability certification in 2013 – and since then collaborating lobster companies have been capable of show the MSC’s blue fish checkmark acknowledged by eco-minded shoppers.

In recent times, MSC briefly suspended however then then re-established the certification, after federal regulators tightened guidelines geared toward defending endangered North Atlantic proper whales from entanglements in lobster fishing gear.

With current science exhibiting that severely entangled whales are prone to die inside three years, the NRDC says lobstering nonetheless poses a mortal danger for the roughly 350 endangered whales left on the planet.

“Frankly it lacks in all precaution,” mentioned Francine Kershaw, a marine mammal biologist on the NRDC. “The willpower comes at a time when proper whales are quickly declining. When fishery administration measures to scale back the chance of entanglement of proper whales and fishing gear are insufficient and severely restricted of their effectiveness, and when the fishery has been illegally licensed beneath the Endangered Species Act and the Marine Mammal Safety Act by the US authorities.”

The MSC is now proposing a brand new certification for the fishery, on the advice of an out of doors marketing consultant. That peer-reviewed evaluation pointed to proof that amongst different issues, the correct whales’ use of the Gulf of Maine has fallen off lately, and ropes utilized by the Maine lobster fishery pose a decrease danger for the animals in comparison with areas the place the whales are congregating in larger numbers and for longer intervals.

And Virginia Olsen of the Maine Lobstering Union calls the NRDC effort unlucky.

“Maine fishermen have stepped as much as implement whale guidelines time and time once more,” Olsen mentioned in an e-mail. “Maine fishermen have been saving proper whales for hundreds of years, if you happen to’re consuming Maine Lobster you are not solely consuming essentially the most sustainable lobster nevertheless it’s whale- secure lobster too.”

Officers on the Marine Stewardship declined remark, pending a third-party adjudication of the problem by NRDC and others. However whereas that’s beneath approach, lobster from Maine can proceed to hold the sustainability label.