[Federal Register Volume 66, Number 89 (Tuesday, May 8, 2001)]
[Notices]
[Page 23236]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 01-11552]


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DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration

[I.D. 050301E]


Individual Fishing Quotas Program for Pacific Halibut and 
Sablefish in the Alaska Fisheries

AGENCY: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

ACTION: Proposed information collection; comment request.

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SUMMARY: The Department of Commerce, as part of its continuing effort 
to reduce paperwork and respondent burden, invites the general public 
and other Federal agencies to take this opportunity to comment on 
proposed and/or continuing information collections, as required by the 
Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995, Pub. L. 104-13 (44 U.S.C. 
3506(c)(2)(A)).

DATES: Written comments must be submitted on or before July 9, 2001.

ADDRESSES: Direct all written comments to Madeleine Clayton, 
Departmental Paperwork Clearance Officer, Department of Commerce, Room 
6086, 14th and Constitution Avenue NW, Washington DC 20230 (or via 
Internet at <a href="/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection#733e301f120a071c1d33171c105d141c05"><span class="__cf_email__" data-cfemail="236e604f425a574c4d63474c400d444c55">[email protected]</span></a>).

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Requests for additional information or 
copies of the information collection instrument(s) and instructions 
should be directed to Patsy A. Bearden, F/AKR2, P.O. Box 21668, Juneau, 
AK 99802-1668 (telephone 907-586-7008).

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:

I. Abstract

    NMFS manages the Pacific halibut and sablefish fisheries in Alaska 
through an Individual Fishery Quota program (IFQ) that allocates annual 
total catch limits to individual fishermen. Fishermen are assigned 
Quota Shares (QS)for the fisheries, and then annually received an IFQ. 
As part of its management program, NMFS monitors the IFQs assigned to 
vessel categories B, C, or D by corporations and partnerships.
    To ensure that corporations and partnerships are not erroneously 
issued annual IFQ resulting from the collectively-held QS, NMFS seeks 
to add a requirement that each corporation or partnership annually 
identify all current shareholders or partners and affirm the entity's 
continuing existence as a corporation or partnership.
    NMFS' Restricted Access Management program (RAM) requires annual 
updates on the status of corporations, partnerships, and other 
collective entities holding QS for two reasons. First, the IFQ 
regulations require that collective entities holding QS transfer the 
collectively-held QS to a qualified individual upon any change in the 
corporation, partnership, or other collective entity, and the 
regulations define such a change as the addition of a shareholder, 
partner, or member to the collective entity. This requirement is 
intended to promote an owner-operated fishery and to prevent the 
accumulation of QS by speculative investors. To monitor collectively-
held QS adequately, RAM needs the annual updates on the status of 
collective entities that this collection of information would provide 
to ensure a collective entity's continuing existence as such.
    Also, the IFQ Program requires that the QS holder be aboard the 
vessel harvesting the QS holder's annual IFQ. Under certain conditions, 
however, an individual QS holder may hire a skipper to fish the QS 
holder's IFQ. One such condition is that the QS holder own the vessel 
from which the hired skipper harvests the IFQ. Since the inception of 
the IFQ Program in 1995, NMFS's policy has interpreted vessel ownership 
liberally to allow an individual QS holder who meets all other 
conditions to hire a skipper to fish his or her IFQ from a vessel owned 
by a corporation, partnership, or other collective entity in which the 
individual QS holder is a shareholder, partner, or member. Likewise, 
collective entities holding QS may hire skippers to fish the 
collectively-held IFQ from a vessel owned by a member of the 
collective. This arrangement is known informally as ``indirect 
ownership.'' Hence, to ensure that individuals and collective entities 
claiming indirect vessel ownership for purposes of hiring skippers are 
in fact linked to the entity owning the vessel, RAM needs the annual 
updates on the status of collective entities to monitor ``indirect'' 
ownership.

II. Method of Collection

    The information is submitted to respond to requirements set forth 
in a regulation.

III. Data

    OMB Number: None.
    Form Number: None.
    Type of Review: Regular submission.
    Affected Public: Not-for-profit institutions, business and other 
for-profit organizations.
    Estimated Number of Respondents: 50.
    Estimated Time Per Response: 30 minutes.
    Estimated Total Annual Burden Hours: 25.
    Estimated Total Annual Cost to Public: $50.

IV. Request for Comments

    Comments are invited on: (a) whether the proposed collection of 
information is necessary for the proper performance of the functions of 
the agency, including whether the information shall have practical 
utility; (b) the accuracy of the agency's estimate of the burden 
(including hours and cost) of the proposed collection of information; 
(c) ways to enhance the quality, utility, and clarity of the 
information to be collected; and (d) ways to minimize the burden of the 
collection of information on respondents, including through the use of 
automated collection techniques or other forms of information 
technology.
    Comments submitted in response to this notice will be summarized 
and/or included in the request for OMB approval of this information 
collection; they also will become a matter of public record.

    Dated: May1, 2001.
Madeleine Clayton,
Departmental Paperwork Clearance Officer, Office of the Chief 
Information Officer.
[FR Doc. 01-11552 Filed 5-7-01; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 3510-22-S


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