King crab quota cut in half

Andrew Jensen, Alaska Journal of Commerce

Oct 3, 2011 - 09:05 PM

UPDATE: Cuts worth $50 million at docks based on 2010 price

UPDATE: St. Matthews blue king crab a bright spot

ADFG has released the Bristol Bay red king crab quota, and it is way down.

The total allowable catch, or TAC, is just 7.83 million pounds. That's about half the 14.84 million pounds in 2010. Everyone expected the quota to be down, and it's clear ADFG is being highly precautionary in the face of declining trends in juvenile recruitment seen in the last few years.

For IFQ holders, it's just more than 7 million pounds with 783,400 pounds to CDQ groups.

As expected, the tanner (bairdi) crab fishery is closed, as it has been determined to be overfished.

A change in the tanner overfishing limit, or OFL, was announced to the North Pacific council in the last couple days, and will allow a higher snow (opilio) crab quota than previously thought. That annoucement has been delayed until Wednesday, as previously reported here. Today council analyst Diana Stram told the council the revised tanner OFL would allow about 30 percent more snow crab harvest.

Here's the ADFG annoucement on Bristol Bay red king crab, this post will be updated.

UPDATE: Here's some perspective on the magnitude of this cut.

It's the lowest harvest quota for Bristol Bay red king crab since 1988, when it was 7.38 million pounds. The fishery was also closed in 1994 and 1995.

In economic terms, Bristol Bay red king crab fetched $7 per pound or more in ex-vessel value last year. Based on that price it's about a $50 million loss at the docks, and about $94 million in lost first wholesale revenue.

UPDATE: One bright spot in the crab TAC announcements is St. Matthews blue king crab. That TAC is up 47 percent, to 2.36 million pounds in 2011-12. Last year's quota of 1.6 million pounds brought $5 per pound at the docks, or about $8 million in ex-vessel revenue.

Another note after crunching some of the annual Bristol Bay king crab harvest numbers. The 47 percent cut in quota is the largest year-to-year cut since 1992-93, when it was reduced by 53 percent. That cut foreshadowed the eventual closure of the fishery in 1994 and 1995.

Prior to 1993, you have to go back to the infamous crash of the stock in 1981 for larger year-to-year change, when the harvest declined by 91 percent in 1982 and was followed by a closure of the fishery in 1983.