unitex@rubbs.fidonet.org (unitex) (10/04/89)
Forwarded From : GREENPEACE Newsline
U.S. TO ENFORCE RULES PROTECTING SEA TURTLES
By WILLIAM BOOTH
Washington Post Staff Writer
Following a summer of public vacillation over how to protect
endangered sea turtles, Commerce Department officials announced
Tuesday that they would enforce their regulations and require
commercial shrimp fishermen to use special nets to prevent the
accidental drownings of turtles.
The decision, which Commerce officials said is final, follows
months of on-again, off-again enforcement of the government
regulation that requires shrimpers to use "turtle excluder
devices" in their trawl nets. These devices, which are little
more than metal cages with trapdoors, are designed to allow sea
turtles to escape from nets. Five species of sea turtle,
including the Kemp's Ridley, are threatened with extinction.
Commerce Secretary Robert A. Mosbacher has several times
announced that his agency will enforce the use of the excluder
devices, only to reverse himself following complaints by Gulf
Coast lawmakers and violent protests by fishermen.
Shrimpers in July protested the use of the devices by blockading
ports in Texas and Louisiana. The shrimpers maintain that the
excluder devices are cumbersome and dangerous to operate.
Moreover, the devices reduce their catch and clog with sea grass
and bottom debris, said Jacqueline Taylor, the wife of a
commercial shrimper and a representative of Concerned Shrimpers
of America, in an interview in August. Taylor said that
shrimpers, many of them fiercely independent men, would stop
fishing rather than use the government-ordered devices.
Until Tuesday's final decision, Mosbacher was only requiring
shrimpers to pull up their nets every 105 minutes, revive the
dazed turtles and return them to the sea. Environmental groups,
led by the National Wildlife Federation, which sued the
government over enforcement of the special devices regulations,
opposed the compromise, contending that too many turtles would
drown.
Newly appointed Commerce Undersecretary John A. Knauss, who
heads the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA),
said yesterday that NOAA scientists suggested the limited tow
times as an alternative to Mosbacher on the assumption that all
the comatose turtles pulled from the nets would survive. "It was
an optimistic assumption," said Knauss.
An internal memorandum by NOAA's scientists had concluded
earlier that "the only reasonable and prudent alternative which
will allow shrimping to continue without jeopardizing the
continued existence of identified turtle species is full
implementation of the (turtle excluder device) regulations."
NNOAA will begin to enforce the excluder regulations on Friday,
though shrimpers will be given several weeks to install the
devices.
* Origin: >> You can't sink a Rainbow << [Echo-coordinator] (2:513/13.1302)
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