2024-27685. Fisheries Off West Coast States; Coastal Pelagic Species Fisheries; Annual Specifications; 2024-2025 Annual Specifications and Management Measures for Pacific Sardine

Table 1—Harvest Specifications for the 2024-2025 Sardine Fishing Year, in Metric Tons

[mt]

Biomass estimate	OFL	ABC	HG	ACL	ACT
58,614	8,312	6,005	0	6,005	5,500

The following are the additional management measures and in-season accountability measures for the 2024-2025 Pacific sardine fishing year:

(1) If landings in the live bait fishery reach 3,000 mt of Pacific sardine, then a per-trip limit of 1 mt of Pacific sardine applies to the live bait fishery;

(2) An incidental per-landing limit of 30 percent (by weight) of Pacific sardine applies to other CPS primary directed fisheries ( e.g., Pacific mackerel);

(3) If the ACT of 5,500 mt is attained, then a per-trip limit of 1 mt of Pacific sardine applies to all CPS fisheries ( i.e., (1) and (2) will no longer apply); and

(4) An incidental per-landing allowance of 2 mt of Pacific sardine applies to non-CPS fisheries until the ACL is reached.

In addition to the management measures and in-season accountability measures listed in the previous paragraphs, Pacific sardine catch in the minor directed fishery for finfish remains limited to 1 mt per trip per day, and 1 trip per day by any vessel, per regulations at 50 CFR 660.511(d)(2).

Background

At the April 2024 Pacific Fisheries Management Council (Council) meeting, the Council's Scientific and Statistical Committee (SSC) reviewed a Stock Assessment Review (STAR) panel report on the Southwest Fisheries Science Center's 2024 benchmark stock assessment, and also reviewed the benchmark stock assessment itself, titled “Assessment of the Pacific sardine resource ( Sardinops sagax ) in 2024 for U.S. management in 2024-2025.” The SSC concluded that the 2024 benchmark assessment for Pacific sardine is the best scientific information available for the management of Pacific sardine. During their review, the SSC noted major improvements in methodology from the 2020 benchmark assessment, including an updated habitat model for assigning fishery catch and survey biomass to the northern and southern subpopulations of Pacific sardine. However, the SSC applied a category 2d sigma uncertainty buffer which, compared to a category 1, equates to a larger allowance for scientific uncertainty, and therefore a lower ABC and a decreased risk of overfishing. During the discussion of the appropriate category, the SSC discussed potential uncertainty in the relationship between sardine productivity and ocean temperatures recently used to calculate the E_MSY parameter of the OFL and ABC control rules, as well as uncertainty in the strength of the 2023 year-class represented in the stock assessment, along with other uncertainties in the data used in the assessment.

The CPS FMP control rules, as they apply to annual reference points, use the following formulas:

OFL = Biomass * E_MSY * DISTRIBUTION

ABC = Biomass * BUFFER * E_MSY * DISTRIBUTION

Biomass. The estimated stock biomass of Pacific sardine ages 1 and older, in metric tons.

E_MSY . The exploitation rate for deterministic equilibrium maximum sustainable yield. Since 2014, based on annual recommendations by the Pacific Fishery Management Council's SSC, the E_MSY for Pacific sardine has most recently been based on a temperature-recruitment relationship based on a running 3-year average of the California Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries Investigations (CalCOFI) temperature index.

DISTRIBUTION. The average portion of the Pacific sardine biomass estimated to be in the U.S. EEZ off the Pacific coast. DISTRIBUTION is currently defined in the CPS FMP as 87 percent and is based on the average historical larval distribution obtained from scientific cruises and the distribution of the resource according to the logbooks of aerial fish-spotters.

BUFFER. The percentage reduction of the OFL as determined by the SSC's evaluation of scientific uncertainty (sigma) and the Council's risk policy (P*).

Rebuilding Plan and Oceana, Inc., v. Raimondo, et al.

During the 2019-2020 fishing year, the estimated biomass of sardine dropped below its minimum stock size threshold of 50,000 mt, which triggered an overfished determination process. NMFS accordingly declared the stock overfished on June 26, 2019 and notified the Council on July 9, 2019. NMFS worked with the Council to develop a rebuilding plan for Pacific sardine to ( print page 93524) implement within two years and finalized it on June 24, 2021 (86 FR 33142). The rebuilding plan maintained the status quo management for Pacific sardine, which includes a complete closure of the primary sardine fishery. Oceana, an environmental non-governmental organization, challenged this rebuilding plan and later included a challenge to the 2023-2024 annual specifications (“2023 Final Rule”; 88 FR 41040), in an action filed in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California: Oceana, Inc., v. Raimondo, et al., No. 5:21-cv-05407-VKD (N.D. Cal., filed July 14, 2021). In its rulings on the challenges, the Court partially vacated the rebuilding plan and held that NMFS failed to demonstrate that it relied on best available science to set the overfishing limits in using the CalCOFI temperature index to determine E_MSY for the 2023 Final Rule.

Partially-Vacated Rebuilding Plan

The Court partially vacated the rebuilding plan on June 28, 2024. Accordingly, NMFS cannot rely on the vacated components of the rebuilding plan to guide these annual specifications. The harvest control rules in place before Amendment 18 to the CPS FMP implemented the now partially-vacated rebuilding plan are still applicable. None of the provisions of Amendment 18, whether vacated or not, changed the previously applicable harvest control rules.

E MSY

NMFS considered the recent order from the Court in making a determination that the harvest specifications and management measures in this action would prevent overfishing, rebuild the stock, and are supported by the best scientific information available. As they have in previous years, the SSC recommended an OFL and ABC for the 2024-2025 fishing year that were calculated, in part, by using an E_MSY based on a relationship with CalCOFI temperatures as best scientific information available for preventing overfishing. The CPS FMP does not mandate that E_MSY be based on this relationship. Under the MSA, the SSC provides scientific advice for NMFS' consideration in fishery management decisions, including ABC and preventing overfishing. Per National Standard 2 at 50 CFR 600.315(a)(2), scientific information that is used to inform decision making should include an evaluation of its uncertainty and management decisions should recognize the risks, such as those to overfishing, associated with the sources of uncertainty. The SSC discussed the potential uncertainty surrounding the use of the CalCOFI-based E_MSY when considering their choice of the appropriate sigma for the ABC. NMFS has determined that the use of a Category 2 sigma, as recommended by the SSC, appropriately accounts for any scientific uncertainty and gaps in scientific information that may exist, including any surrounding E_MSY, in the information used to calculate the recommended reference points.

In making the determination to approve the OFL and ABC recommended by the Council, NMFS took into account the fact that the SSC recommended that the analysis and assumptions surrounding a CalCOFI based E_MSY be revisited. This was one of several scientific recommendations made by the SSC in April 2024. Other recommendations included a potential reconsideration of the need for the precaution provided by the DISTRIBUTION term, noting that a substantial proportion of the U.S. catch in recent years is inferred to be from the southern subpopulation of Pacific sardine and that there has been a decline in the assumed catch of northern subpopulation by Mexico, as well as endorsement of the eight high-priority research recommendations for future sardine stock assessments in the 2024 sardine STAR panel report. All of these recommendations are typical of the scientific process to inform fishery management decisions such as determining an appropriate OFL and ABC to prevent overfishing and achieve optimum yield in the fishery.

NMFS also examined recent and past years' CalCOFI temperatures in relation to this year's calculated CalCOFI-based E_MSY . The calculated value for this year is 0.163 and represents the lowest E_MSY in 10 years, and falls in the lower range of expected values. The decline in E_MSY this year compared to the last 3 years is the result of a high temperature record year in 2020 falling out of the running 3-year average temperature used to calculate E_MSY . This effect was also observed between 2014 and 2017 when a very large marine heatwave off the Pacific coast caused unprecedented disruptions in the ocean environment, resulting in high CalCOFI temperatures. The highest CalCOFI temperature in 40 years was recorded in 2015. Such events increase the running 3-year average temperature used to calculate E_MSY . To reduce the risk of potentially excessive E_MSY values, the SSC recommended in 2014 that a CalCOFI-based E_MSY be restricted to a maximum of 0.25 (for reference, this equated to a temperature of 16.16 °C when the median temperature was 15.90 °C). This cap on E_MSY was applied to calculations of the reference points for the 2016-2017 and 2018-2019 fishing years.

Although the Court found that NMFS' rationale for exclusively using CalCOFI data to determine E_MSY in order to set the 2023-2024 specifications was inadequate, it explicitly declined to prohibit NMFS from employing the CalCOFI-based E_MSY in setting catch limits, and stated that the agency must reassess the rebuilding plan and determine how to meet the requirements of the MSA in view of the Court's order. In light of the Court's finding prior to the issuance of the 2024-2025 harvest specifications, and as part of a robust decision-making process, NMFS considered whether there was alternative scientific information, per 50 CFR 600.315(a)(2), that would warrant disapproving the Council's recommendation.

Although E_MSY is lower this year than any E_MSY used in the last 10 years, NMFS acknowledges there is still scientific uncertainty surrounding the predictive efficacy of the CalCOFI temperature index. However, as explained in both the proposed rule and this final rule, this uncertainty was considered by the SSC and the Council when recommending a 2,307 mt reduction from the OFL to the ABC ( i.e., OFL is 8,312 mt but ABC and ACL are both 6,005 mt). Importantly, as discussed in the proposed rule and in the paragraphs that follow, in addition to accounting for any scientific uncertainty surrounding CalCOFI, NMFS also considered the only available alternative to its use, which resulted in a higher value than the CalCOFI-based E_MSY, and determined the lower value was appropriate to use in setting this year's specifications.

Currently, there are no other formulaic relationships between Pacific sardine recruitment and an environmental variable on which to base E_MSY . However, past analyses have calculated a stochastic (referenced as “static” in proposed rule) E_MSY of 0.18 when the effects of temperature on productivity are ignored.^[1] This value for E_MSY was recommended by the SSC and utilized by NMFS as best scientific information available for management in 2012-2014 as an alternative to the default option of applying the temperature-stock relationship due to uncertainty surrounding the ( print page 93525) relationship at that time.^[2] During the Council's April 2023 Pacific sardine harvest specification process, the SSC specifically compared this stochastic value to the CalCOFI-based 2023-2024 E_MSY of 0.22 in its discussion of an appropriate OFL buffer: “There was no support among SSC members for a category 1 designation, but there was some discussion of the merits of a category 2 versus a category 3 assessment. Although uncertainty in E_MSY would argue for increased uncertainty in the OFL, it was noted that the `nondynamic' harvest rate (estimated to maximize long-term yield in stochastic simulations), of 0.18, is not very different from 0.22 based on current SSTs, and that other CPS stocks have rates that are higher still (Pacific mackerel E_MSY is ~0.3).” ^[3]

NMFS considers this modeled stochastic E_MSY of 0.18 as the only available alternative that could have been considered in making OFL determinations for Pacific sardine without the use of the CalCOFI temperature index. However, the Council's SSC recommended to the Council an OFL that utilized the CalCOFI-based E_MSY as the best scientific information available. In making the decision to approve the OFL and ABC in this action, NMFS considered the stochastic E_MSY of 0.18. NMFS concluded that, at this time, it cannot make a determination that the stochastic E_MSY of 0.18 represents a better alternative to the CalCOFI-based E_MSY value the SSC recommended as the best scientific information available for determining this year's OFL. Since 2000, when the CPS FMP was adopted and harvest control rules were established for Pacific sardine, it has been determined that making efforts to include environmental information into the management of Pacific sardine is the preferred approach. And although the relatively recent running 3-year average CalCOFI temperatures have resulted in higher values than in previous years, likely as a result of anomalous, although becoming more frequent, oceanographic events, that may appear to contradict the original concept of the environmental E_MSY, this year's temperature and resulting E_MSY align with the concept as they are both in the lower range of values during a time of relatively low sardine recruitment. NMFS will continue, as it has each year, to evaluate whether the use of the CalCOFI-based E_MSY is the best scientific information available for future annual specifications.

As noted in the proposed rule, the Council's recommended OFL, calculated using an E_MSY of 0.163, is a lower OFL and therefore more precautionary than an OFL would have been based on the stochastic E_MSY of 0.18. Additionally, it has been previously suggested that one approach to set a precautionary proxy fishing mortality rate for small pelagic fish such as Pacific sardine is to use a value that equates to one half of the species natural mortality rate.^[4] Based on the estimates of natural mortality from the 2024 Pacific sardine stock assessment, this formula would produce an E_MSY in the range of 0.25-0.30. By contrast, the E_MSY utilized to calculate the OFL implemented through this action is only 0.163. For these reasons, NMFS has determined that the reference points recommended by the Council are based on the best scientific information available and, therefore, NMFS has determined to implement them through this action.

Annual Catch Limit

Although this action implements an ACL equal to the ABC at 6,005 mt, as envisioned by the FMP, NMFS has determined that as a result of the closure of the directed fishery and additional management measures, landings of the northern subpopulation of Pacific sardine will remain very low and total U.S. sardine landings are highly unlikely to exceed 2,200 mt, similar to what has occurred since the 2015-2016 fishing year, when the directed fishery was closed (see table 2).

Table 2—Landings Attributed in the 2024 Pacific Sardine Stock Assessment to Northern and Southern Subpopulations of Pacific Sardine (2014-2023), in Metric Tons

Fishing year	ACL	Total landings of Pacific sardine (combined catch of northern and southern subpopulations)	Assumed landings of northern subpopulation of Pacific sardine
2014-2015	23,293	23,113	19,969
2015-2016	7,000	1,919	75
2016-2017	8,000	1,885	602
2017-2018	8,000	1,775	351
2018-2019	7,000	2,278	525
2019-2020	4,000	2,062	627
2020-2021	4,000	2,276	657
2021-2022	3,000	1,772	298
2022-2023	3,800	1,619	517