Northeast Area Monitoring and Assessment Program (NEAMAP) 2011 Data collection and analysis in support of single and multispecies stock assessments in the Mid-Atlantic: Northeast Area Monitoring and Assessment Program Near Shore Trawl Survey Final Report

Abstract

Concerns regarding the status of fishery-independent data collection from continental shelf waters between Cape Hatteras, North Carolina and the U.S. / Canadian border led the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission’s (ASMFC) Management and Science Committee (MSC) to draft a resolution in 1997 calling for the formation of the Northeast Area Monitoring and Assessment Program (NEAMAP) (ASMFC 2002). NEAMAP is a cooperative state-federal program modeled after the Southeast Area Monitoring and Assessment Program (SEAMAP), which has been coordinating fishery-independent data collection south of Cape Hatteras since the mid1980s (Rester 2001). The four main goals of this new program directly address the deficiencies noted by the MSC for this region and include 1) developing fishery-independent surveys for areas where current sampling is either inadequate or absent 2) coordinating data collection among existing surveys as well as any new surveys 3) providing for efficient management and dissemination of data and 4) establishing outreach programs (ASMFC 2002). The NEAMAP Memorandum of Understanding was signed by all partner agencies by July 2004