Our work on local and state aquaculture continues, and we have been busy!

CALIFORNIA FISH AND GAME COMMISSION UPDATES

Last week, we organized a joint letter (with nine other NGOs) to the California Fish and Game Commission in advance of the Marine Resources Committee meeting regarding state aquaculture.

The letter supports:

a continued hiatus on the acceptance of any new aquaculture leases,
the California Ocean Protection Council’s development of statewide coordinated aquaculture principles and a state aquaculture action plan,
the California Coastal Commission’s December 2020 Final Coastal Development Permit (CDP) Application Guidance.

In addition, we raised concerns with unsustainable types of aquaculture such as bivalve facilities that use pesticides, operations that damage eelgrass, and any large finfish facilities.

We plan to testify at the March 16th Marine Resources Committee public meeting. Next week’s discussion follows up the November 2020 meeting where the Fish and Game Commission voted to extend the hiatus on new aquaculture leases for four months.

Last month, we raised concerns before the Fish and Game Commission about the problematic and environmentally damaging use of hydraulic pump gear in Tomales Bay for recreational clam fishing. We joined the Commission’s staff in supporting emergency regulations to prohibit hydraulic pump use while also supporting the requirement to use a separate container for clam collection to ease enforcement efforts. The Commission unanimously adopted the emergency regulations.

“We support the ban to avoid unnecessary impacts to sensitive eelgrass and intertidal habitat, as well as unsustainable fishing. Both Tomales Bay, a Ramsar site, and Drakes Estero, the only west coast marine wilderness south of Alaska, are very sensitive estuarine habitats that should be afforded the highest protection. Eelgrass is a critical foundation species, designated as essential fish habitat and relied on by many bird species, many of which are in decline.”

— Ashley Eagle-Gibbs, Conservation Director

CALIFORNIA COASTAL COMMISSION UPDATES

At the end of last year, we testified at the California Coastal Commission meeting in support of the Commission’s Final Coastal Development Permit Application Guidance. We thanked staff for their “dedication to monitoring coastal development in a changing climate … [no] easy task.”

We also joined NGO partners in late 2020 in opposing problematic projects in federal waters, as well as asking the Biden administration to support domestic, sustainable wild-capture fishing instead of industrial aquaculture development.

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