NOAA Fisheries Announces a Proposed Rule to Establish the Quotas, Opening Dates, and Retention Limits for the 2018 Atlantic Shark Commercial Fishing Season

The National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) announces a proposed rule that would establish quota levels, opening dates, and retention limits for the 2018 Atlantic commercial shark fisheries.

The proposed 2018 quotas, adjusted as appropriate to account for over- and underharvests, are summarized in Table 1 by management group.  Adjustments based on over- and underharvests depend on stock status.  The proposed rule uses landings data received as of July 14, 2017.  The final rule will be based on updated data received in dealer reports as of October 2017.  Thus, the quotas in the proposed rule are subject to change in the final rule.  All dealer reports that are received after the date of the final rule will be used to adjust the 2019 quotas, as appropriate.       

Who is affected?

This action could affect:

• Any commercial shark fishermen in the northwestern Atlantic Ocean, including the Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean Sea.
• Any dealers who buy or sell sharks or shark products in these areas.

What will it do?

The proposed adjusted quotas, retention limits, and opening dates are:    

*1 mt dw = 2,204.6 lb dw

**Base quota adjusted based on over- or underharvest in 2017.

 Submit Comments by September 21, 2017:

Written comments, identified by “NOAA-NMFS-2017-0069”, may be submitted electronically via the Federal eRulemaking Portal http://www.regulations.gov, or sent by fax or mail to the contact information included below.   All comments received are a part of the public record and will generally be posted to http://www.regulations.gov without change.  All Personal Identifying Information (for example, name, address, etc.) voluntarily submitted by the commenter may be publicly accessible.  Do not submit Confidential Business Information or otherwise sensitive or protected information.  NMFS will accept anonymous comments (enter N/A in the required fields, if you wish to remain anonymous).  You may submit attachments to electronic comments in Microsoft Word, Excel, WordPerfect, or Adobe PDF file formats only.

This notice is a courtesy to the HMS fishery participants to help keep you informed about the fishery.  Copies of these documents are available upon request from the Highly Migratory Species Management Division, 1315 East-West Highway, Silver Spring, MD 20910 (phone: 301-427-8503, fax: 301-713-1917) or on the HMS website at: http://www.nmfs.noaa.gov/sfa/hms/.  For further information on this final rule and its requirements, contact Guý DuBeck or Karyl Brewster-Geisz at 301-427-8503.  The information will also be posted on the HMS website at:  http://www.nmfs.noaa.gov/sfa/hms/news/news_list/index.html.