The National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) - the federal agency charged with protecting endangered salmon - moved yesterday t\o increase the Pacific whiting allocation to the Makah tribe. The Makah's whiting fishery, which began in 1996, has consistently exceeded NMFS' own biological guidelines for incidental catch of endangered salmon by a substantial amount. The action came two days after the tribe ignited public controversy by harvesting a gray whale under their tribal treaty rights.

"We can't understand how NMFS can justify ignoring its own biological opinion and turn a blind eye to excessive salmon bycatch while at the same time it ignores complaints from fishermen and land-owners about its zeal in conserving fisheries," said Rod Moore, Executive Director of the West Coast Seafood Processors Association. "The Pacific Fishery Management Council, members of the U.S. House and Senate, The Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, and the west coast seafood community all recommended that allocations between tribal and non- tribal fisheries remain at status quo. This agency has lost touch with reality."

Salmon are accidentally taken in the Pacific whiting fishery by both tribal and non-tribal fishermen. In a biological opinion published under the Endangered Species Act, NMFS established a "level of concern" for salmon bycatch that should not be exceeded. Non-tribal fishermen and processors have developed several programs to keep bycatch low, ranging from elaborate computer tracking to direct fishing vessels away from areas of high bycatch to blunt economic dis-incentives: if your bycatch starts to go up, you can't go fishing. Bycatch is monitored by observers on floating processing vessels and through an on-shore observer program coordinated by the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife.

"Since the time that the biological level was established, non-tribal fisheries have worked hard to keep their incidental catch to under 2/5 of that level, " said Moore. "In contrast, the Makah tribal fishery has ranged from 170% to over 200% bycatch of endangered salmon. NMFS has obscured these figures by mixing them with the non-tribal catch. Now, NMFS is rewarding the high-bycatch Makah tribal fishery by giving them more fish. What kind of example does this provide to those fishermen who make every effort to obey the law and conserve fish?"