Panel Votes To Ban Bottom Trawling in Northern Bering Sea

An advisory fisheries panel voted Sunday to put 180,000 square miles (466,200 square kilometers) of the northern Bering Sea off-limits to bottom trawling, a form of fishing that conservation groups say is destructive to vulnerable habitat for numerous species.



The North Pacific Fishery Management Council, which advises the federal government on fisheries in federal waters off Alaska, made its unanimous decision Sunday at a meeting in Sitka after asking the public to weigh in with options for about 330,000 square miles (854,700 square kilometers) of the entire Bering Sea. Options adopted now go through the regulatory process with the National Marine Fisheries Service.

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