The Gulf of Maine Research Institute in Portland has won two grants totaling $2.4 million to support the groundfish industry's transition to a new management system.
The new system, called sector management, provides groups of fishermen called sectors with quotas of fish, which each sector then decides how to divvy up. It's intended as an alternative to the old system, based on the number of days fishermen are allowed to spend at sea.
The grants are funded by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's National Marine Fisheries Service. About $1.5 million of the money will go directly to the groundfish industry to offset the costs of organizing and monitoring the fishing sectors.
Smaller awards -- approximately $15,000 per sector -- will be used to hire sector managers, set up offices, purchase equipment and establish systems for sectors to report data to NOAA. A total of 17 New England sectors are proposed for the upcoming fishing year.