And that's exactly the type of information that's too big a job for private industry to undertake.

The reason is simple. Getting information like this is like working at a tremendously complicated jigsaw puzzle. It takes years of effort. Continuous effort directed at basic research. It takes special equipment aboard vessels designed for carrying out technological research over a long period of time. Nobody can predict how long that time will be. But unless it is continuous, it will be a waste of money. Not only a waste of money but also time that can never, never be regained. Information of this kind and like that which is spelled out in the brief tiled by the New England Fisheries Committee is needed badly. Getting this basic information is a proper function of the Federal Government. It's too huge a task for industry to pick away at piece by piece. The big advantage of the Government's role is that the facts will be available for all interests. But most of all, it can be better organized and systematized.

And order is of the essence.

Without it there would be nothing but a terrific welter of details. Just so many pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. All meaningless unless arranged into a significant picture.

We consider that the Fish and Wildlife Service of the Department of the Interior would be the proper agency to do this work. It is our considered opinion that transfer of the funds as contemplated by Senate 202 would be of inestimable value. The funds involved are not very large but they will help to supplement the regular budget.

Only a shoal draft intellect would fail to realize the benefits that would accrue. Judicious employment of these funds would result in more efficient utilization of fishing time and boats, both inshore and deep-legged vessels, gear, shore plants and facilities. Costs would be reduced, thereby making us more competitive with subsidized foreign imports. A greater uniformity of higher quality food would then be afforded to Mrs. Consumer throughout the country at reasonable cost.

Senator DUFF. In view of the fact that there are a number of other witnesses to be heard, we will adjourn at this time to meet at 1: 45 this afternoon.

(Whereupon, at 12:32 p. m., the hearing was recessed to 1:45 o'clock, p. m., same room.)

AFTERNOON SESSION

The subcommittee reconvened at 1:50 p. m., pursuant to adjournment, in room G-16 in the Capitol, Senator James H. Duff, chairman of the subcommittee, presiding.

Senator DUFF. Mr. Richard E. Reed of Augusta, Maine.

STATEMENT OF RICHARD E. REED, EXECUTIVE SECRETARY, MAINE SARDINE INDUSTRY, AUGUSTA, MAINE

Mr. REED. Mr. Chairman, my name is Richard E. Reed. I represent the Maine sardine industry. This fishery is one of the basic industries of the State of Maine and has been for about 80 years and gives employment to approximately 8,000 workers and fi-hermen, and through 47 plants operated by about 35 companies.

Over the past 20 years this industry has produced an average of about 2,600,000 cases or 260 million cans of seafood.

At a meeting of our group held several weeks ago, the Maine sardine industry unanimously went on record as endorsing this legislation, at a meeting held in Bangor, Maine, on February 26, 1954. In doing so, they generally subscribe to the theory that our Government should do more to help protect and conserve and develop our fisheries. Furthermore, in taking such action, the group expressed the opinion that at least one-half of the money would be made available as a result of sardine imports should be used on projects which would be helpful to the domestic sardine industry, but this was not a definite stipulation of their support of the legislation.

None can dispute that this important Maine industry has a big stake in the legislation as Bureau of Census figures for the period 1949 to 1953 show that of the $54,122,000 collected from import duties on all fishery products, sardines were responsible for 13 percent or $7,118,824. Although they heartily subscribe to the theory that the Federal Government should generally give more support to the development and protection of its commercial fisheries, our crowd now finds themselves in a position whereby such assistance is desparately needed and fast. But they also have a more particularly pressing problem of their own, so that is why we are so much interested in this bill.

Something has happened to our fish supply up there. The Maine sairdine industry is faced with an emergency of real proportions. This has been brought on by an abnormal scarcity of fish in 2 of the past 3 years, and scientists speculate that the situation may be a part of a worldwide change in ocean conditions and temperatures which is apparently affecting many fishery resources.

Naturally we hope that such thinking is wrong and feel that it is the responsibility and duty of the Congress to help the industry and the State finance research activity which is necessary to get the answer. Prior to 1951 there had not been a serious shortage of herring in Maine waters for 13 years. During the 1951 season catches and therefore sardine production was off more than 50 percent as compared with a 25-year average, and in 1953 the situation was repeated.

This double blow has actually staggered our processors whose operations and profits are necessarily based on volume production in order to cope with their competitors in the food-manufacturing field. Hundreds of fishermen have either gone broke or been forced out of business and scores of factory workers have not earned enough money to qualify for unemployment compensation.

This shortage has been a very bad thing for the fishermen, the packers, and for the economy of the Maine coast in general. We don't know what has happened to the fish up there. Something has gone on up there, whether it is water currents, temperatures, or whatever it is. We don't know, but we do know we have to find out soon if we are going ot save this industry and if the businesses are going to know where to turn next.

It is recognized that a staff of experts with adequate equipment could not reverse the forces of nature, but they can find the source of the trouble and at least give our industry an indication of which way to turn. It is imperative that we find out whether the condition is of a temporary nature or similar to the chain of events which has xirtually destroyed the big pilchard sardine industry on the West

coast.

I might add also that the situation affects other States along the coast as well as Maine as the herring run over quite a wide area up there.

The industry is willing to expend its own funds on this work and the State will contribute, but the job is too big for them to do alone. It is estimated that the study should be continued for at least 5 years at an annual cost of around $125,000, and the bill looks to be the fairest and most logical source of funds as it does not add any further burden to the American taxpayer.

I would like to repeat that extensive studies of the North Atlantic herring resource should be launched before it is too late, and we are sure that no Member of Congress wishes to see the Maine sardine industry become a desert of bankruptcies and dying communities for the lack of a diagnosis and a doctor.

Members of the Maine congressional delegation have been deeply concerned with this problem for some time, and if this legislation is not approved, we have no alternative but to ask our elected representatives to seek a supplemental appropriation for the United States Fish and Wildlife Service to finance the research.

Although the strange behavior of the fish is our industry's chief worry at the present time, it has many other problems and a growing pressure of foreign competition is one of them. Since the war Morocco, Yugoslavia, South Africa, Australia, and Japan have been concentrating on our markets while Portugal and Norway, our two largest competitors have expanded their merchandising activities in this country to a great degree.

We do not fear competition when the odds are even, but it is a historical fact that the fisheries of the above-mentioned countries have always been given heavy Government support, while the situation has been reversed so far as our own commercial fisheries are concerned. Is this not another good argument in support of the legislation under consideration?

With additional funds, the United States Fish and Wildlife Service could expand their marketing and educational activities as a further means of helping the American fish people to continue as a going and taxpaying concern.

We feel that the service would spend the additional funds wisely and effectively in many fields and that the stepped-up activities would do much to counteract the favorable advantages now being enjoyed and utilized to the limit by our foreign competitors. We also subscribe to the theory of an industry advisory committee to assist the service in its activities.

Although our group recognized the importance of agriculture to the basic economy of our country, they could not find any logical reason why the farmers of the land should receive such munificent support from our Government while comparatively none has ever been given to the farmers of the sea. We do not have accurate figures, but it has been estimated that more of the American taxpayers' dollars have been sent to other countries as direct help to their fisheries during the past 8 years than has been spent to develop and protect our own commercial fisheries for the past 20 years.

Our group does not believe that the diversion of 30 percent of the import duties on fishery products from the hundreds of millions now

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being spent on agriculture would be more than a drop in the bucket or barely missed by that agency while on the other hand it would literally be a bonanza to the perpetually underfinanced Fish and Wildlife Service and permit that agency to do the job for which it was created.

We hope that the committee and the Congress will give the fullest consideration to this statement as well as to those of others who are here representing the fishing industry.

I thank you.

Senator DUFF. Do you think overfishing has anything to do with it? Mr. REED. No, sir; we know it has not up there.

Senator DUFF. What is your last year's catch up there in sardines? Mr. REED. Let us figure it in cases packed. It was about 1,800,000

cases.

Senator DUFF. The year before?

Mr. REED. 3 million.

Senator DUFF. The year before that?

Mr. REED. 1,600,000.

Senator DUFF. Before that?

Mr. REED. 3,900,000.

Senator DUFF. Does that mean you have alternate good and bad years?

Mr. REED. Yes, but prior to the last bad years we had we hadn't had a bad year since 1939.

Senator DUFF. What would be the average between 1939 and the three bad years?

Mr. REED. About 2,800,000 cases.

Senator DUFF. The reason I asked you whether it was overfishing is due to the fact that on the west coast they have had practically the same diminution.

Mr. REED. They have had a different situation out there.

Senator DUFF. They have a very small percentage today of what they had 10 years ago.

Mr. REED. That is right.

Senator DUFF. They have only a token of what they had 20 years

ago.

Mr. REED. We don't know the problem. We know up there, from what little scientific research has been done, it is pretty well indicated it is not overfishing.

Senator DUFF. What would be your offhand impression of what the reason is for the diminution?

Mr. REED. I don't know. No one knows. Whether it is the change in the water currents or whether it is change in the ocean bottom, no one knows, and I say, there has never been any research done on the resource up there. If we had some research going on in the last 10 years, we would find▬▬

Senator DUFF. For one I thoroughly believe that these biological studies are imperative and necessary, but I have personally fished from Nova Scotia to the Gulf of Mexico, and all the way along the Pacific coast, and everywhere I have fished I have found serious violations in the way of doing things that would interfere with small fish, enormous waste of small fish, netting of fish in the type of nets that killed an enormous number of what ought to be good fish in

a year or so, and also, I have made it my business in several places over the last 10 years to go in places where ordinarily you would expect fish to be running about the time they were spawning in which they were caught illegally after dark in large numbers and everything of that kind.

I am firmly in favor of this bill. I don't want to be misunderstood. I think that we have too long neglected an acknowledgement of many of these fundamental facts, but I think your industry itself has a job, too, to participate actively in the way of discouraging and preventing and even outlawing practices that are very detrimental.

Mr. REED. We have very stringent conservation laws in Maine. We do not think

Senator DUFF. Some of these places where I have been had very stringent laws but, the trouble is, nobody enforced them.

Mr. REED. Well, I think they are enforced up there.

Senator DUFF. I think this is an enormously important matter. I think it has been too long neglected. I am completely in favor of this bill, but I think there is a whole lot of collateral things we have to do that are just as important as the provisions of this bill, if we are to restore our fisheries. In order to accomplish that, we must do away with the waste that has taken place in the past.

Mr. REED. I think you are right; that is true in many instances. Thank you very much.

Senator DUFF. Do you have any questions?

Senator MAGNUSON. No; no questions.

Senator DUFF. Mr. J. Richards Nelson.

STATEMENT OF J. RICHARDS NELSON, PRESIDENT, OYSTER GROWERS AND DEALERS ASSOCIATION OF NORTH AMERICA, ACCOMPANIED BY DAVID WALLACE, OYSTER GROWERS AND DEALERS ASSOCIATION OF NORTH AMERICA

Mr. NELSON. Mr. Chairman, Senator Magnuson, the name is J. Richards Nelson, president, Oyster Growers and Dealers Association of North America.

Our association represents the oyster growers of the country. We have membership on the east coast and in the gulf and on the west coast also. We are the oldest trade association in the fisheries, having been founded in 1908. Oysters are produced in 19 States in our country. They were an important source of food for the early settlers, and they abounded in the brackish water bays along the entire east, west, and gulf coasts. The harvesting of them took place at such a rapid rate that even by the beginning of the 20th century depletion of many of the natural beds had already taken place.

Oyster farming came into existence as natural beds became depleted. Oysters spawn during warm weather starting in the early spring in the gulf area and later farther up the coast with a normal date of mid-July in New England.

have

Incidentally, quite a number of the aforementioned States would very few oysters today if it were not for oyster farming carried on under water.

In oysters the sexes are separate and the chance mingling of eggs and sperm in the water results in the production of microscopic larvae