This website lists the potential sector contribution (PSC) data for each limited access Northeast multispecies permit. Amendment 16 to the Northeast Multispecies Fishery Management Plan established a qualifying period to determine the PSC for each limited access Northeast multispecies permit. The PSC represents the portion of total commercial landings during the qualifying period for which a particular permit was responsible. Each approved sector and permit bank will receive an annual catch entitlement (ACE) based on the collective PSCs of its member permits and the current commercial sub-ACL.
PSC is presented two ways. You may view PSC as a percentage with 7 decimal places (e.g., 1.2345678%), or as the amount, in live pounds, of a stock that a permit would contribute to a sector or permit bank in a specific fishing year. You may select PSC information by year, beginning with fishing year 2010.
Additional FAQ information, as well as a description of how PSCs are calculated are available.
The fishing privileges and catch history associated with each limited access Northeast multispecies permit are identified with a unique number, the moratorium right identifier (MRI). While a given set of privileges may move from one vessel to another, and change permit numbers in the process, the MRI always stays the same. PSC information is presented for each MRI.
PSCs are not confidential under the Magnuson-Stevens Act because they are not information submitted to us, but are the results of calculations we made of proportional contributions that can change annually, rather than specific trip landing information. Even if PSCs were considered confidential information submitted by vessel owners, they would be exempt from the confidentiality protections of the Magnuson-Stevens Act and releasable because we use PSCs to make determinations under the Northeast Multispecies Fishery Management Plan.
In the table showing PSC as a percentage, each permit has a GB cod PSC and a GB haddock PSC. However, in the table showing PSC in pounds, each permit has an Eastern amount and a Western amount for GB cod and GB haddock.
We do not assign an individual permit separate PSCs for the Eastern GB cod or Eastern GB haddock; instead, we assign each permit a PSC for the GB cod stock and GB haddock stock. Each sector's GB cod and GB haddock allocations are then divided into an Eastern ACE and a Western ACE, based on each sector's percentage of the GB cod and GB haddock ACLs. For example, if a sector is allocated 4 percent of the GB cod ACL and 6 percent of the GB haddock ACL, the sector is allocated 4 percent of the commercial Eastern U.S./Canada Area GB cod total allowable catch (TAC) and 6 percent of the commercial Eastern U.S./Canada Area GB haddock TAC as its Eastern GB cod and haddock annual catch entitlements (ACEs). These amounts are then subtracted from the sector's overall GB cod and haddock allocations to determine its Western GB cod and haddock ACEs.
These data are the best available when this report was compiled. Not all sectors or permit banks existed or operated in each year. Differences between years may be due to corrections made to the landings database, or recalculation of PSCs due to MRI cancellation by vessel owners. Differences from the PSC letters can be due to inseason ACL changes during the fishing year, or mergers between MRIs.
*Note for sector managers: Fishing year 2012 GOM cod PSCs on this page differ from SIMM, because SIMM displays each MRI's share of GOM cod for fishing year 2012. The share was an MRI's percentage of the sector sub-ACL after accounting for GOM cod carryover from fishing year 2011.