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Federal Register / Vol. 86, No. 38 / Monday, March 1, 2021 / Rules and Regulations
substantially engaged in and/or substantially dependent on the CGOA
rockfish fisheries managed under the Rockfish Program, Kodiak is the most centrally engaged in and dependent on the fishery as measured by multiple indices across multiple sectors of the fishery. Kodiak has experienced beneficial impacts across harvester, processor, and support services sectors because of the implementation of the Rockfish Program, relative to the preRockfish Pilot Program conditions, and has specifically benefitted from several community protection measures built into the program. Although not all individual operations have benefitted equally from the change in qualifying years between the Rockfish Pilot Program and the Rockfish Program, no substantial adverse sector-level or community-level impacts resulting from the implementation of the Rockfish Program have been identified for the community of Kodiak.
Comment 15: It is indicated within the EA that climate change is a reasonably foreseeable future action that may have an impact on primary and secondary species located within the action area. Given this explicit understanding of the looming detrimental impacts of climate change, even if the drastic increase in harvesting does not single handedly reduce the viability of the fish population, there is minimal room for natural phenomena to take place in combination with the harvesting increase while maintaining a viable fish stock that can support the industry. To ignore the risks of climate change and resulting El Nino events on the rockfish population coupled with increasing harvest, and its potential to decimate this rockfish population as seen in the West Coast, suggest that the proposed rule should fully consider the risk of climate change and take more restrictive conservational measures.
Response: Section 2.2.3 of the EA
states that climate change is the only reasonably foreseeable future action RFFA identified as likely to have an impact on primary and secondary target species allocated within the action area and timeframe, the EA concludes that considering the direct and indirect impacts of the proposed action when added to the impacts of past and present actions, previously analyzed in other documents incorporated by reference, and the impacts of the RFFAs listed above, the cumulative impacts of the proposed action are determined to be insignificant. Effects of the action and RFFAs on the target species are considered insignificant, because they are not expected to jeopardize the capacity of the stock to yield sustainable
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biomass on a continuing basis and are unlikely to affect the distribution of harvested stocks either spatially or temporally such that it has an effect on the ability of the stock to sustain itself.
Although the net effect of climate change on fish resources is currently difficult to predict with accuracy, NMFS
and the Council use the Ecosystem Status Reports ESR to track the status and trends of ecosystem components through a variety of indicators that are synthesized through a blend of data analysis and modeling to produce ecosystem assessments. The ESR may thus provide early warning signals of direct ecosystem impacts that may affect fish resources, including rockfish species that could warrant management intervention or evidence of the efficacy of previous management actions, as well as track performance in meeting the stated ecosystem-based management goals of the Council.
NMFS reviews the RFFAs, including climate change, as described in the Harvest Specifications Environmental Impact Statement EIS each year to determine whether they occurred and, if they did occur, whether they would change the analysis in the Harvest Specifications EIS of the impacts of the harvest strategy on the human environment See ADDRESSES. In addition, NMFS considers each year whether other actions not anticipated in the Harvest Specifications EIS occurred that would have a bearing on the harvest strategy or its impacts. Each year stock assessment authors review the previous years ESR for factors that may impact stock/complex biomass and summarize those for the Plan Teams review.
Indicators of concern can be highlighted within each stock assessment and can be used by the Groundfish Plan Teams and the Council to justify modification of allowable biological catch ABC
recommendations or time/space allocations of catch. NMFS anticipates that current monitoring of groundfish trends and environmental conditions through selected key indicators, reporting in the annual ESRs, and incorporation of this information into the annual stock assessments and the harvest specification process is currently sufficient to alert the Council and NMFS managers to changes to rockfish population trends and conditions.
Comments on the Information Collection Supporting Statements for OMB Control Numbers 06480678 and 06480545
Comment 16: A commenter identified a couple changes to the supporting statement for the Rockfish Program
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collection of information OMB Control Number 06480545. First, the commenter disagreed with the statement that the cooperative must form an association with the processor to which it historically delivered the most rockfish. The cooperative/processor associations are intended to ensure that a cooperative lands a substantial portion of its catch with its members historic processor. This was the case during the Rockfish Pilot Program. However, with the current Rockfish Program a cooperative must form an association with a processor within the city limits of Kodiak but that processor need not be the members historic processor.
Second, the supporting statement notes that the Rockfish Program Vessel CheckIn/Check-Out and Termination of Fishing Report and Application for Rockfish Cooperative Fishing Quota CQ may be submitted to NMFS more often than quarterly. The commenter thinks the Agency meant that the Application for Inter-Cooperative Transfer of Rockfish Cooperative Quota and the Rockfish Program Vessel CheckIn/Check-Out reports may be submitted more often than quarterly these transfers and check ins/outs occur many times over the season. The Application for Rockfish Cooperative Fishing Quota is submitted only once per year and any Termination of Fishing Report would be submitted only once per year.
Response: NMFS agrees with these changes, and they are reflected in the supporting statement for OMB Control Number 06480545 associated with this final rule.
Comment 17: A commenter was heartened to read that NMFS Alaska Region is currently working on offering submission of the Application for Rockfish Cooperative Fishing Quota application online through eFISH. The use of eFISH for vessel check-in and check-outs and CQ transfers greatly reduced the time and paperwork burden for the cooperatives so they look forward to being able to submit the annual cooperative applications online through eFISH.
Response: NMFS acknowledges this comment.
Comment 18: Note that the fishery management council in Alaska is the North Pacific Fishery Management Council NPFMC, not Alaska Council. Note that the program is titled, Central Gulf of Alaska Rockfish Program, not Alaska Rockfish Program.
Response: In response to this comment, the title of the information collection for OMB Control Number 06480678 has been changed from Alaska Council Cooperative Annual
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