Fishermen on the Frontlines of Addressing Modern Ocean Problems
GENERAL DESCRIPTION:
Fishermen have always faced numerous challenges. Two prevailing, contemporary challenges are climate change and plastic pollution. This project seeks to leverage and grow ongoing collaborative research efforts of the Commercial Fisheries Research Foundation that can help address these broad issues while creating new jobs for fishermen. To do this, we will mobilize the fishing industry to collect data that can help better understand oceanographic changes, monitor species with shifting distributions, remove ghost gear from the ocean, and help pave the way for an alternative squid fishery in Southern New England.
Project components:
This award is split into four objectives that will help achieve the overall goals of the project. Click on the links below to learn more about how we are achieving each of these objectives!
Leveraging the Black Sea Bass Research Fleet to conduct a multi-year winter juvenile black sea bass survey
Creating an informed implementation strategy for automatic squid jigging
Continuing and expanding ghost gear removal from Rhode Island waters
media coverage:
Senator Jack Reed Event held October 2023 - ‘Making a Splash_ Reed Delivers $500,000 for RI Fisheries Research _ Senator Jack Reed’
