Climate Resilience Supported by the Inflation Reduction Act
The Council is advancing six, multi-year initiatives to make fishery management more climate-ready and resilient. Funded through the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), these projects address changing ocean conditions, shifting species distributions, and uncertainty in productivity and stock assessments while exploring new approaches to management, governance, and stakeholder engagement. Together, the six projects are designed to help the region’s fishery resources and communities better adapt to a changing climate through management.
IRA 1: ABC Control Rules for Northeast Multispecies focuses on testing and implementing refined approaches to developing harvest control rule for setting catch limits.
IRA 2: Northeast Multispecies Management Transition will convene a series of facilitated sessions to help the Council consider opportunities to modernize the Northeast Multispecies Fishery Management Plan (FMP) to accommodate ongoing challenges.
IRA 3: Operationalizing Ecosystem Approaches integrates climate and ecosystem science into risk policies, catch advice, and other aspects of management.
IRA 4: Operationalizing the East Coast Climate Change Scenario Planning Initiative updates regional governance agreements and considers possible alternative permitting structures. This is a joint initiative between the New England, Mid-Atlantic, and South Atlantic Fishery Management Councils, the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission, and NOAA Fisheries.
IRA 5 - Holistic Strategic Plan for Climate Resilient New England Fisheries Management establishes long term goals, objectives, and strategies to guide the Council’s work. For updates and to read the final plan, visit the Strategic Planning page.
IRA 6 - Enhancing Participatory Processes for Climate Resilient Fisheries modernizes the Council’s webpage and other outreach tools to reflect these cross-cutting projects. This intuitive focuses specially on the use of AI and automation to improve Council efficiency, and public communications to increase transparency.