Subsistence fishers from throughout Interior Alaska will be present at the Alaska Board of Fisheries (BOF) Meeting, February 20th-25th at the Dena’ina Civic and Convention Center in Anchorage, to provide testimony in support of Proposal 140. Proposal 140 was submitted by the Fairbanks Advisory Committee Fisheries Subcommittee and would reduce the allowed commercial fishing times and areas in the South Alaska Peninsula (Area M) during the month of June, when most Arctic-Yukon-Kuskokwim (AYK) bound chum salmon pass through this district.
“Commercial harvests have been prioritized over subsistence and the livelihood of our people for too long,” says Chief/Chairman Brian Ridley, Tanana Chiefs Conference (TCC), “In 2021 when there were no chum salmon harvests on the Yukon, over 740,000 Western Alaska chum were legally caught between Area M and the Bering Sea Pollock fisheries, meanwhile our people are criminals if they catch a single fish.”
The BOF permits Area M commercial fishermen to intercept enormous quantities of chum from the AYK stocks while they are migrating to their spawning grounds. Chinook stocks on the Yukon River are in the severest decline ever seen and recent chum salmon returns to the Yukon and Kuskokwim rivers are the lowest on record.
AYK subsistence fishers have maximized conservation efforts with zero or severely restricted harvest as escapement goals continue to not be met. Subsistence fishers have exhausted their conversation efforts, and now it is up to the BOF to take action.
TCC is supportive of all efforts to conserve our salmon, which are an essential component of Alaska Native culture, traditions and way of life. In 2022, TCC successfully submitted resolutions which were adopted by both the Alaska Federation of Natives and the National Congress of American Indians supporting reduced fishing.