Publications
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Resource Sharing: The Berkeley Criterion
2015 · Ken Hinman
When we fish, we join the ocean world as predators. That is what we are, by nature, and have been since early times. But unlike other predators, we are limited only by the limits we set for ourselves. Or so we’d like to think. We are subject to all the same natural laws as other predators, yet we behave as if we were not – as though we could fish without regard for fishing’s impact on the ecosystems we share.
All creatures share an evolutionary drive to selfishly advance their own species. But in our case, a narrow view of “sustainable” fishing, a lack of regard for sustaining other forms of life in the sea, and “a power over the natural world we can no longer afford to use” all work to our collective disadvantage, irreparably harming the environment that supports all of us.
In this paper, Ken Hinman suggests a more balanced, more natural and far wiser approach to managing marine fisheries, grounded in policies that sustain fishing in a way that protects the broader ecosystem and its living communities. It is, quite simply, Resource Sharing – a novel concept that is nevertheless essential to our co-existence with wild oceans. The future of fishing, we believe, lies in the balance.
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Preserving the Northeast Forage Base
2010 · Ken Hinman and Pam Lyons Gromen
Red flags are raised as to the state of the Northeast forage base as a whole. This report examines the Northeast U.S. fisheries for Atlantic herring, mackerel, menhaden, butterfish, squid, river herring and American shad, and finds that nearly all commercially targeted stocks are declining, at historic lows, or not meeting fishery quotas. The authors point to single-species management that ignores predator needs, weak catch monitoring and heavy bycatch of river herring and shad. They recommend ecological reference points, stock assessments that account for predators, better at-sea observer coverage, and coordinated action on bycatch and fishery plans.
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Taking the Bait: Are America’s Fisheries Out-Competing Predators for Their Prey?
2006 · Pam Lyons Gromen
This NCMC report covers the basics of forage fish and why they are important. It asks whether U.S. fisheries for herring, sardines, anchovies, menhaden, squid and mackerel are depriving ocean predators of the prey they need, citing signs of malnourished predators such as bluefin tuna, striped bass, seabirds, Steller sea lions and right whales. After reviewing three fishery management plans, the authors found that none made forage protection a primary objective or set precautionary catch buffers. They call for plans that put forage first, better food web information, ecological reference points, and precautionary catch limits and forage reserves.
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Ocean Roulette: Conserving Sharks, Swordfish and other Pelagic Fish in Longline-Infested Waters
1998 · Ken Hinman · Out of print
A first-ever, comprehensive report based on a study of the destructive practice of fishing with drift longlines. The 1998 NCMC report looks at how pelagic longlining affects Atlantic swordfish, tunas, billfish and sharks, and finds that longlines are non-selective: in 1993, about half of the fish hooked by the U.S. Atlantic longline fleet were discarded, and more than half of those were dead. The authors conclude that most of these species are overfished and that landing-based rules cannot control fishing mortality. They recommend a moratorium on pelagic longlining, with interim no-longlining zones, gear restrictions, satellite vessel monitoring and a phase-down of longline permits as alternatives.