On 17 April, U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order (EO) directing the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), NOAA, and the United States Trade Representative – among other authoritative bodies – to tackle a range of tasks to boost the domestic seafood industry.
Many of those tasks have limited timelines attached, giving the departments between 30 and 180 days to accomplish duties ranging from identifying “the most heavily overregulated fisheries” to developing a comprehensive seafood trade strategy.
U.S. senators and seafood organizations praised the order as a means of supporting the U.S. seafood industry.
“The [EO] outlines key actions to benefit every link in the supply chain – from hardworking fishermen to parents who serve their family this nutritious and sustainable protein at home,” National Fisheries Institute President and CEO Lisa Wallenda Picard said. “Importantly, the EO calls for reducing unnecessary regulatory burdens on fishermen and seafood producers while also promoting the many benefits of eating seafood as part of a healthy, balanced diet.”
U.S. Senator Dan Sullivan (R-Alaska) called the new executive order a “shot in the arm” for the U.S. seafood industry and said it will provide relief for fishermen.
While the industry is largely supportive of the EO, some representatives and organizations that have worked with NOAA on regulatory policy in the past are skeptical of whether the agency will have the capacity now to follow through on the EO's goals.
“NOAA has already lost so many people as a result of the probationary cuts, and even more will be retiring early,” Stimson Center Senior Fellow and Director of its Environmental Security Program Sally Yozell told SeafoodSource.
The broad set of tasks ordered by Trump for NOAA and for the Secretary of Commerce came just days after reports indicated the Trump administration could be planning to gut the agency entirely, which itself occurred as the department was already facing cuts by the Elon Musk-led Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), including the firing of NOAA employees en masse that have already had impacts on commercial fishers and fisheries.
Yozell said the Reduction in Force (RIF) plans are still unknown for NOAA and its line officers, and the EO's multi-faceted goals of expanding aquaculture, boosting fishing, and bringing processing back to the U.S. is a “laudable but very tall order” that would require a high degree of expertise which the department ...
