The draft 2012 economic status report of the Stock Assessment and Fishery Evaluation (SAFE) Report for the North Pacific groundfish fisheries was recently prepared for the September Groundfish Plan Team meeting. The report presents information on various economic characteristics of the commercial groundfish fisheries in the BSAI and GOA regions, including harvest and processing activity; prohibited species catch; ex-vessel and first wholesale value; and fishing effort. The 2012 economic status report will be presented at December meeting of the North Pacific Fishery Management Council.
AKFIN provided programming, database management, and project management support to the Alaska Fisheries Science Center, Economics and Social Science Program in production of the report. Efforts to standardize ex-vessel pricing methods in the SAFE with other agency pricing methods are ongoing and being facilitated through AKFIN’s gross earnings workgroup.