Repelling Foreigners

Posters plastered all over the picturesque fishing port of New Bedford, Mass., proclaim: THE SOVIET FISHING FLEET IS TWELVE MILES OFF OUR COAST AND SUCKING UP EVERYTHING THAT SWIMS, CRAWLS OR HIDES IN THE SAND. Beneath ominous-looking silhouettes of Russian trawlers, the posters urge: SUPPORT THE 200-MILE FISHING LIMIT. Congress is now getting the message. This week both House and Senate are expected to pass a bill extending U.S. jurisdiction over coastal waters from its present twelve miles to 200 miles; President Ford's signature is likely. Under the bill, which will take effect next March, the Government will enforce quotas on how many fish can be caught, and by whom, within the 200-mile "resource zone." U.S. fishermen will net as much of the quota as they physically can; foreign vessels will be licensed to catch only the remainder. TIME Correspondent David Wood, who has covered the fishing industry dockside and at sea, reports:

The bill's progress has caused a surge of optimism in the ailing East Coast fishing industry, especially in New England ports. Fishermen there have long blamed foreign competition, particularly from Russian trawlers, for drastically declining catches and soaring fresh-fish prices. In 1957 more than 1 billion lbs. of fish were caught off New England; by 1974 the catch had been chopped about in half, to 521 million lbs. As late as October 1971, yellowtail flounder (commonly served in East Coast restaurants as sole) brought 6-c- per lb. at New Bedford's daily fish auctions; last week the price was 85-c-. Now, says one New Bedford fisherman, "with the foreign invaders gone, perhaps our industry can grow a little." Seven spanking new steel-stern trawlers, worth upwards of $250,000 each, have already appeared alongside New Bedford's mostly wooden, archaic vessels. There are even predictions that the annual catch off New England might triple in as little as five years to a value of more than $250 million.

Though East Coast catches certainly should increase somewhat, that euphoria seems exaggerated. Some 63% of the 6.5 billion lbs. of fish that Americans eat each year is imported, and U.S. fishermen will not automatically inherit that share. Many of the fish sold in the U.S. are caught by European vessels in the North Atlantic, outside even the 200-mile limit and well beyond the reach of American ships. Within the 200-mile zone, there is a serious question of how many fish remain to be caught by anybody.

Overfishing by both foreign and domestic fleets has been so bad that some marine scientists fear cod, haddock and yellowtail will never become abundant again. The productivity of East Coast fleets is also held down by the small size and unrefrigerated holds of most of their boats and outdated trawling methods.

Longer-term prospects for U.S. fishermen look brighter. The unilateral extension of U.S. jurisdiction to 200 miles will inevitably prompt other nations to follow suit, causing sweeping changes in traditional fishing patterns. (The United Nations Law of the Sea Conference has yet to take any multilateral action.) Nations with short coastlines, like Poland and East Germany, could find themselves sharply restricted as to where they can fish, and new markets for U.S.-caught fish could open up.

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