21958 Federal Register / Vol. 77, No. 71 / Thursday, April 12, 2012 / Proposed Rules 

The 2011 season lasted 48 days, but the 

recreational quota was exceeded, and 

thus, the 2012 season is expected to be 

shorter. As a result, absent a reduction 

in the bag limit or other extreme 

circumstances that changes the effort, 

harvest rate, or availability of fish, the 

likelihood of the season extending to 

October 1 is not precisely known, but 

considered unlikely. Therefore, this 

action is not likely to have any direct 

economic effect on any small entities in 

the foreseeable future. 

This proposed rule would also 

increase the combined commercial and 

recreational red snapper quotas in 2012 

by 895,000 lb (405,965 kg) and by an 

additional 610,000 lb (276,691 kg) in 

2013 (or a total increase of 1.505 million 

lb (0.683 million kg) over the 2011 

combined commercial and recreational 

quotas), if the 2012 combined quota is 

not exceeded. These increases would be 

expected to result in an increase in 

revenue and profits to the affected 

commercial and for-hire fishing 

businesses. 

In summary, this proposed rule, if 

implemented, would be expected to 

increase profits to all directly affected 

small entities. 

Because this proposed rule, if 

implemented, would not be expected to 

have any direct adverse economic 

impact on any small entities, an initial 

regulatory flexibility analysis is not 

required and none has been prepared. 

List of Subjects in 50 CFR Part 622 

Fisheries, Fishing, Puerto Rico, 

Reporting and recordkeeping 

requirements, Virgin Islands. 

Dated: April 6, 2012. 

Alan D. Risenhoover, 

Acting Deputy Assistant Administrator for 

Regulatory Programs, National Marine 

Fisheries Service. 

For the reasons set out in the 

preamble, 50 CFR part 622 is proposed 

to be amended as follows: 

PART 622—FISHERIES OF THE 

CARIBBEAN, GULF, AND SOUTH 

ATLANTIC 

1. The authority citation for part 622 

continues to read as follows: 

Authority: 16 U.S.C. 1801 et seq. 

2. In § 622.2, the definition for 

‘‘shrimp’’ is revised to read as follows: 

§ 622.2 Definitions and acronyms. 

* * * * * 

Shrimp means one or more of the 

following species, or a part thereof: 

(1) Brown shrimp, Farfantepenaeus 

aztecus. 

(2) White shrimp, Litopenaeus 

setiferus. 

(3) Pink shrimp, Farfantepenaeus 

duorarum. 

(4) Royal red shrimp, Hymenopenaeus 

robustus. 

(5) Rock shrimp, Sicyonia brevirostris. 

* * * * * 

3. In § 622.34, paragraph (m) is 

revised to read as follows: 

§ 622.34 Gulf EEZ seasonal and/or area 

closures. 

* * * * * 

(m) Seasonal closure of the 

recreational sector for red snapper. The 

recreational sector for red snapper in or 

from the Gulf EEZ is closed from 

January 1 through May 31, each year. 

During the closure, the bag and 

possession limit for red snapper in or 

from the Gulf EEZ is zero. 

* * * * * 

4. In § 622.42, paragraphs (a)(1)(i) and 

(a)(2)(i) are revised to read as follows: 

§ 622.42 Quotas. 

* * * * * 

(a) * * * 

(1) * * * 

(i) Red snapper. (A) For fishing year 

2012—4.121 million lb (1.869 million 

kg), round weight. 

(B) For fishing year 2013—4.432 

million lb (2.010 million kg), round 

weight. 

* * * * * 

(2) * * * 

(i) Recreational quota for red snapper. 

(A) For fishing year 2012, the 

recreational quota for red snapper is 

3.959 million lb (1.796 million kg), 

round weight. 

(B) For fishing year 2013, the 

recreational quota for red snapper is 

4.258 million lb (1.931 million kg), 

round weight. 

* * * * * 

[FR Doc. 2012–8756 Filed 4–11–12; 8:45 am] 

BILLING CODE 3510–22–P 

DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE 

National Oceanic and Atmospheric 

Administration 

50 CFR Part 660 

[Docket No. 120403254–2255–01] 

RIN 0648–XB045 

Fisheries Off West Coast States; 

Coastal Pelagic Species Fisheries; 

Annual Specifications 

AGENCY: National Marine Fisheries 

Service (NMFS), National Oceanic and 

Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), 

Commerce. 

ACTION: Proposed rule. 

SUMMARY: NMFS proposes to implement 

the annual catch limit (ACL), harvest 

guideline (HG), annual catch target 

(ACT) and associated annual reference 

points for Pacific mackerel in the U.S. 

exclusive economic zone (EEZ) off the 

Pacific coast for the fishing season of 

July 1, 2011, through June 30, 2012. 

This rule is proposed according to the 

Coastal Pelagic Species (CPS) Fishery 

Management Plan (FMP). The proposed 

2011/2012 ACL or maximum HG for 

Pacific mackerel is 40,514 metric tons 

(mt). The proposed ACT, which will be 

the directed fishing harvest target, is 

30,386 mt. If the fishery attains the ACT, 

the directed fishery will close, reserving 

the difference between the ACL and 

ACT (10,128 mt) as a set aside for 

incidental landings in other CPS 

fisheries and other sources of mortality. 

This rule is intended to conserve and 

manage the Pacific mackerel stock off 

the U.S. West Coast. 

DATES: Comments must be received by 

April 30, 2012. 

ADDRESSES: You may submit comments 

on this document identified by NOAA– 

NMFS–2012–0072 by any of the 

following methods: 

• Electronic Submissions: Submit all 

electronic public comments via the 

Federal eRulemaking Portal http:// 

www.regulations.gov. To submit 

comments via the e-Rulemaking Portal, 

first click the ‘‘submit a comment’’ icon, 

then enter NOAA–NMFS–2012–0072 in 

the keyword search. Locate the 

document you wish to comment on 

from the resulting list and click on the 

‘‘Submit a Comment’’ icon on the right 

of that line. 

• Mail: Submit written comments to 

Rodney R. McInnis, Regional 

Administrator, Southwest Region, 

NMFS, 501 West Ocean Blvd., Suite 

4200, Long Beach, CA 90802. 

• Fax: (562) 980–4047 

Instructions: Comments must be 

submitted by one of the above methods 

to ensure that the comments are 

received, documented, and considered 

by NMFS. Comments sent by any other 

method, to any other address or 

individual, or received after the end of 

the comment period, may not be 

considered. All comments received are 

a part of the public record and will 

generally be posted for public viewing 

on www.regulations.gov without change. 

All personal identifying information 

(e.g., name, address, etc.) submitted 

voluntarily by the sender will be 

publicly accessible. Do not submit 

confidential business information, or 

otherwise sensitive or protected 

information. NMFS will accept 

anonymous comments (enter ‘‘N/A’’ in 

mstockstill on DSK4VPTVN1PROD with PROPOSALS

Federal Register / Vol. 77, No. 71 / Thursday, April 12, 2012 / Proposed Rules 21959 

the required fields if you wish to remain 

anonymous). Attachments to electronic 

comments will be accepted in Microsoft 

Word or Excel, WordPerfect, or Adobe 

PDF file formats only. 

Copies of the report ‘‘Pacific Mackerel 

(Scomber japonicus) Stock Assessment 

for USA Management in the 2011–12 

Fishing Year’’ and the Environmental 

Assessment/Regulatory Impact Review 

for this action may be obtained from the 

Southwest Regional Office (see 

ADDRESSES). 

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: 

Joshua Lindsay, Southwest Region, 

NMFS, (562) 980–4034. 

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: During 

public meetings each year, the estimated 

biomass for Pacific mackerel is 

presented to the Pacific Fishery 

Management Council’s (Council) Coastal 

Pelagic Species (CPS) Management 

Team (Team), the Council’s CPS 

Advisory Subpanel (Subpanel) and the 

Council’s Scientific and Statistical 

Committee (SSC), and the biomass and 

the status of the fisheries are reviewed 

and discussed. The biomass estimate is 

then presented to the Council along 

with the calculated overfishing limit 

(OFL) and available biological catch 

(ABC), annual catch limit (ACL) and 

harvest guideline (HG) and/or annual 

catch target (ACT) recommendations 

and comments from the Team, Subpanel 

and SSC. Following review by the 

Council and after hearing public 

comment, the Council adopts a biomass 

estimate and makes its catch level 

recommendations to NMFS. 

This proposed rule would implement 

the 2011/2012 ACL, HG, ACT and other 

annual catch reference points, including 

OFL and an ABC that takes into 

consideration uncertainty surrounding 

the current estimate of biomass, for 

Pacific mackerel in the U.S. EEZ off the 

Pacific coast. (The EEZ off the Pacific 

Coast encompasses ocean waters 

seaward of the outer boundary of state 

waters, which is 3 nautical miles off the 

coast, out to a line 200 nautical miles 

from the coast.) The CPS FMP and its 

implementing regulations require NMFS 

to set these annual catch levels for the 

Pacific mackerel fishery based on the 

annual specification framework in the 

FMP. This framework includes a harvest 

control rule that determines the 

maximum HG, the primary management 

target for the fishery, for the current 

fishing season. The HG is based, in large 

part, on the current estimate of stock 

biomass. The harvest control rule in the 

CPS FMP is HG = [(Biomass-Cutoff) * 

Fraction * Distribution] with the 

parameters described as follows: 

1. Biomass. The estimated stock 

biomass of Pacific mackerel age for the 

2011/2012 management season is 

211,126 mt. 

2. Cutoff. This is the biomass level 

below which no commercial fishery is 

allowed. The FMP established this level 

at 18,200 mt. 

3. Fraction. The harvest fraction is the 

percentage of the biomass above 18,200 

mt that may be harvested. 

4. Distribution. The average portion 

(currently 70%) of the total Pacific 

mackerel biomass that is estimated to be 

in the U.S. EEZ off the Pacific coast, 

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. 

At the June 2011 Council meeting, the 

Council adopted the 2011–12 Pacific 

mackerel assessment and a Pacific 

mackerel biomass estimate of 211,126 

metric tons (mt). Based on 

recommendations from its SSC and 

other advisory bodies, the Council 

recommended and NOAA Fisheries 

(NMFS) is proposing, an OFL of 44,336 

mt, an ABC of 42,375 mt, an ACL and 

maximum harvest guideline (HG) of 

40,514 mt, and an ACT of 30,386 mt for 

the 2011/2012 Pacific mackerel fishing 

year. These catch specifications are 

based on the most recent stock 

assessment and the control rules 

established in the CPS FMP. 

If the ACT is attained, the directed 

fishery will close, and the difference 

between the ACL and ACT (10,128 mt) 

will be reserved as a set aside for 

incidental landings in other CPS 

fisheries and other sources of mortality. 

In that event, for the remainder of the 

fishing year, incidental harvest 

measures will be in place, including a 

45 percent incidental catch allowance 

when Pacific mackerel are landed with 

other CPS (in other words, no more than 

45% by weight of the CPS landed per 

trip may be Pacific mackerel), except 

that up to 1 mt of Pacific mackerel could 

be landed without landing any other 

CPS. Upon the fishery attaining the 

ACL/HG (40,514 mt), no vessels in CPS 

fisheries may retain Pacific mackerel. 

The purpose of the incidental set-aside 

and allowance of an incidental fishery 

is to allow for the restricted incidental 

landings of Pacific mackerel in other 

fisheries, particularly other CPS 

fisheries, when the directed fishery is 

closed to reduce bycatch and allow for 

continued prosecution of other 

important CPS fisheries. 

The NMFS Southwest Regional 

Administrator will publish a notice in 

the Federal Register announcing the 

date of any closure to either directed or 

incidental fishing. 

Detailed information on the fishery 

and the stock assessment are found in 

the report ‘‘Pacific Mackerel (Scomber 

japonicus) Stock Assessment for USA 

Management in the 2011–12 Fishing 

Year’’ (see ADDRESSES). 

Classification 

Pursuant to section 304(b)(1)(A) of the 

Magnuson-Stevens Fishery 

Conservation and Management Act, the 

NMFS Assistant Administrator has 

determined that this proposed rule is 

consistent with the CPS FMP, other 

provisions of the Magnuson-Stevens 

Fishery Conservation and Management 

Act, and other applicable law, subject to 

further consideration after public 

comment. 

These proposed specifications are 

exempt from review under Executive 

Order 12866. 

Pursuant to the Regulatory Flexibility 

Act (RFA), 5 U.S.C. 605(b), the Chief 

Counsel for Regulation of the 

Department of Commerce certified to 

the Chief Counsel for Advocacy of the 

Small Business Administration that this 

proposed rule, if adopted, would not 

have a significant economic impact on 

a substantial number of small entities, 

for the reasons as follows: 

The purpose of this proposed rule is 

to implement the 2011/2012 annual 

specifications for Pacific mackerel in the 

U.S. EEZ off the Pacific coast. The CPS 

FMP and its implementing regulations 

require NMFS to set an OFL, ABC, ACL 

and HG or ACT for the Pacific mackerel 

fishery based on the harvest control 

rules in the FMP. The specific harvest 

control rule is applied to the current 

stock biomass estimate to derive the 

annual HG, which is used to manage the 

commercial take of Pacific mackerel. 

The U.S. Small Business 

Administration defines small businesses 

engaged in fishing as those vessels with 

annual revenues of or below $4 million. 

The small entities that would be 

affected by the proposed action are the 

vessels that compose the West Coast 

CPS finfish fleet. Pacific mackerel 

harvest is one component of CPS 

fisheries off the U.S. West Coast, which 

primarily includes the fisheries for 

Pacific sardine, northern anchovy and 

market squid. Pacific mackerel are 

principally caught off southern 

California within the limited entry 

portion (south of 39 degrees N. latitude; 

Point Arena, California) of the fishery. 

Sixty-four vessels are currently 

permitted in the Federal CPS limited 

entry fishery off California. The average 

annual per vessel revenue in 2010 for 

the West Coast CPS finfish fleet was 

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21960 Federal Register / Vol. 77, No. 71 / Thursday, April 12, 2012 / Proposed Rules 

well below $4 million; therefore, all of 

these vessels therefore are considered 

small businesses under the RFA. 

Because each affected vessel is a small 

business, this proposed rule has an 

equal effect on all of these small 

entities, and therefore will impact a 

substantial number of these small 

entities in the same manner. 

Accordingly, there would be no 

economic impacts resulting from 

disproportionally between small and 

large business entities under the 

proposed action. 

The profitability of these vessels as a 

result of this proposed rule is based on 

the average Pacific mackerel ex-vessel 

price per mt. NMFS used average Pacific 

mackerel ex-vessel price per metric ton 

(mt) to conduct a profitability analysis 

because cost data for the harvesting 

operations of CPS finfish vessels was 

limited or unavailable. 

For the 2010/2011 fishing year the HG 

was 11,000 metric tons (mt) and was 

divided into a directed fishery of 8,000 

mt and an incidental fishery of 3,000 

mt. Approximately 2,100 mt of this HG 

was harvested in 2010/2011 fishing 

season with an estimated ex-vessel 

value of $414,256 mt. Using these 

figures, the average 2010/2011 ex-vessel 

price per mt of Pacific mackerel was 

approximately $200. 

The proposed ACL/HG for the 2011/ 

2012 Pacific mackerel fishing season is 

40,514 mt, with a directed fishing 

harvest target or ACT of 30,386 mt. This 

season’s directed fishing target is more 

than 3 times higher than that of the 

previous year. If the fleet were to take 

the entire 2011/2012 ACT, and 

assuming a coastwide average ex-vessel 

price per mt of $206 (average of 2009 

and 2010 ex-vessel), the potential 

revenue to the fleet would be 

approximately $6.3 million. However, 

this result will depend greatly on 

market forces within the fishery, and on 

the regional availability of the resource 

to the fleet and the fleets’ ability to find 

schools of Pacific mackerel. 

Over recent years, the profitability 

from fishing Pacific mackerel has 

depended less on the catch level, and 

more on market forces within the 

fishery as well as the other CPS 

fisheries, and on the regional 

availability of the species to the fleet 

and the fleets’ ability to easily find 

schools relatively close to port. If there 

is no change in market conditions (i.e., 

an increase demand for Pacific mackerel 

product) or proximity of the fish to the 

fleet, it is not likely that the full ACT 

will be taken during the 2011–2012 

fishing year, in which case profits will 

be lower than if the entire ACT were 

taken. The annual average U.S. Pacific 

mackerel harvest from 2001 to 2010 is 

approximately 4,500 mt, and over the 

last 10 years landings have averaged 

approximately 6,000 mt without 

exceeding 10,000 mt. As a result, it is 

unlikely that the ACT proposed in this 

rule will limit the potential profitability 

of the fleet from Pacific mackerel. 

However, the revenue derived from 

harvesting Pacific mackerel is only one 

factor determining the overall revenue 

for a majority of the vessels in the CPS 

fleet, and, therefore, the economic 

impact to the fleet from the proposed 

action cannot be viewed in isolation. 

CPS vessels typically harvest a number 

of other species, including Pacific 

sardine, market squid, northern 

anchovy, and tuna, but focus on Pacific 

sardine, which had an estimated exvessel of $12.5 million in 2010, and 

market squid, which had an estimated 

ex-vessel of $71 million in 2010. 

Therefore, Pacific mackerel is only a 

small component of this multi-species 

CPS fishery and with the incidental 

catch provisions in this rule, the fleet 

will continue to be able to catch these 

other profitable species if the ACT is 

reached and directed mackerel fishing is 

closed. 

Based on the disproportionality and 

profitability analysis above, this rule, if 

adopted, will not have a significant 

economic impact on a substantial 

number of these small entities. As a 

result, an Initial Regulatory Flexibility 

Analysis is not required, and none has 

been prepared. 

There are no reporting, recordkeeping, or other compliance 

requirements required by this proposed 

rule. Additionally, no other Federal 

rules duplicate, overlap or conflict with 

this proposed rule. 

This action does not contain a 

collection-of-information requirement 

for purposes of the Paper Reduction Act. 

Authority: 16 U.S.C. 1801 et seq. 

Dated: April 6, 2012. 

Alan D. Risenhoover, 

Acting Deputy Assistant Administrator for 

Regulatory Programs, National Marine 

Fisheries Service. 

[FR Doc. 2012–8857 Filed 4–11–12; 8:45 am] 

BILLING CODE 3510–22–P 

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