Notice2024-16902
Fisheries of the Exclusive Economic Zone Off Alaska; Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands Management Area; Cost Recovery Fee Notice for the Pacific Cod Trawl Cooperative Program
Primary source
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Published
August 1, 2024
Issuing agencies
Commerce DepartmentNational Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
Abstract
NMFS publishes the fee percentage for cost recovery for the Pacific Cod Trawl Cooperative (PCTC) Program. The fee percentage for 2024 is 1.92 percent. This notice is intended to provide the 2024 fee percentage to calculate the required payment for cost recovery fees due by August 31, 2024.
Full Text
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<title>Federal Register, Volume 89 Issue 148 (Thursday, August 1, 2024)</title>
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[Federal Register Volume 89, Number 148 (Thursday, August 1, 2024)]
[Notices]
[Pages 62724-62725]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [<a href="http://www.gpo.gov">www.gpo.gov</a>]
[FR Doc No: 2024-16902]
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DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
[RTID 0648-XE144]
Fisheries of the Exclusive Economic Zone Off Alaska; Bering Sea
and Aleutian Islands Management Area; Cost Recovery Fee Notice for the
Pacific Cod Trawl Cooperative Program
AGENCY: National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), Commerce.
ACTION: Notice of standard prices fee percentage.
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SUMMARY: NMFS publishes the fee percentage for cost recovery for the
Pacific Cod Trawl Cooperative (PCTC) Program. The fee percentage for
2024 is 1.92 percent. This notice is intended to provide the 2024 fee
percentage to calculate the required payment for cost recovery fees due
by August 31, 2024.
DATES: The fee percentage is valid on August 1, 2024.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Charmaine Weeks, Fee Coordinator, 907-
586-7231.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:
Background
Section 304(d) of the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and
Management Act (Magnuson-Stevens Act) authorizes and requires that NMFS
collect cost recovery fees for limited access privilege programs. Cost
recovery fees include NMFS' actual costs directly related to its
management, data collection, and enforcement of the programs. Section
304(d) of the Magnuson-Stevens Act mandates that cost recovery fees not
exceed 3 percent of the annual ex-vessel value of fish harvested under
any program subject to a cost recovery fee and that the fee be
collected either at the time of landing, filing of a landing report, or
sale of such fish during a fishing season or in the last quarter of the
calendar year in which the fish is harvested.
NMFS manages the PCTC Program as a limited access privilege
program. On August 8, 2023, NMFS published a final rule to implement
this Program (88 FR 53704). The PCTC Program allocates total allowable
catch (TAC) of Pacific cod to trawl catcher vessels and processors in
the Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands area (BSAI). Participants in the
PCTC Program must form a cooperative and associate with a processor.
The PCTC Program includes a process for calculating and administering
cost recovery fees under 50 CFR 679.135. The annual PCTC Program cost
recovery process builds on other existing cost recovery requirements
implemented under other programs. The fee liability is based on the ex-
vessel value of fish harvested in the PCTC Program. Each year, the
Regional Administrator publishes a notice announcing the fee percentage
in the Federal Register and sends invoices to cooperatives before July
31.
Each PCTC Program cooperative is responsible for payment of the
cost recovery fee assessed on Pacific cod landed under the PCTC
Program. Each cooperative must submit any cost recovery fee liability
payment(s) no later than August 31. The total dollar amount of the fee
due is determined by multiplying the NMFS published fee percentage by
the annual ex-vessel value of Cooperative Quota (CQ) landings under the
Program, as described in this notice.
Failure to pay cost recovery fee liabilities by August 31st will
result in NMFS disapproval of a cooperative's application to transfer
CQ or issue a CQ permit the following year until full payment of the
fee liability is received
[[Page 62725]]
by NMFS. NMFS will not issue a CQ permit until NMFS receives a complete
application for CQ issuance and confirmation of the full payment of any
cost recovery fee liability.
Standard Price
For purposes of calculating cost recovery fees, NMFS uses a
standard ex-vessel price (standard price) for Pacific Cod. A standard
price is determined using information on landings purchased (volume)
and ex-vessel value paid (value). NMFS annually receives information
used to calculate the Pacific cod standard price in the existing Bering
Sea and Aleutian Island (BSAI) Pacific cod Ex-vessel Volume and Value
Report, which is submitted in early November of each year. NMFS uses
this existing data source to calculate standard prices and thus
determine the annual PCTC Program fishery value, which, along with the
direct program costs, is used to calculate the annual PCTC Program cost
recovery fee percentage. The standard prices are described in U.S.
dollars per pound for landings made during the previous year. NMFS
published the standard price of 0.42 cents per pound for Pacific cod
for 2024 in the Federal Register on November 24, 2023 (88 FR 82336).
Each landing made under the PCTC Program is multiplied by the
standard price to arrive at an ex-vessel value for each landing. These
values are summed together to arrive at the ex-vessel value of Pacific
Cod (fishery value).
Fee Percentage
Annually, NMFS calculates the applicable fee percentage according
to the factors and methods described at Sec. 679.135 for the PCTC
Program. NMFS used the standard price of 0.42 cents to calculate the
fee percentage applied to landings made in 2024. NMFS determined the
fee percentage that applies to landings made in the A and B seasons,
which extend from January 20 to June 10, 2024, by dividing the total
costs directly related to the management, data collection, and
enforcement of the program (direct program costs) by the value of the
catch subject to the cost recovery fee.
NMFS captures direct PCTC program costs through an established
accounting system that allows NMFS staff to track labor, travel,
contracts, rent, and procurement costs. For 2024, the direct program
costs for the PCTC Program were tracked from October 1, 2023 to June
30, 2024. NMFS began tracking PCTC Program management costs after the
effective date of the final rule implementing the PCTC Program (88 FR
53704, August 8, 2023). NMFS will publish an annual report on the NMFS
Alaska Region website in the first quarter of 2025 that summarizes
direct program costs for the PCTC Program.
Using the fee percentage formula described generally above, the
estimated percentage of direct program costs to fishery value for the
2024 calendar year is 1.92 percent for the PCTC Program. For 2024, NMFS
applied the fee percentage to each PCTC landing that was debited from a
CQ allocation between January 20 and June 10 to calculate the fee
liability for each cooperative. A PCTC cooperative's 2024 fee payments
must be submitted to NMFS on or before August 31, 2024. Payment must be
made in accordance with the payment methods set forth in Sec.
679.135(a)(3).
Authority: 16 U.S.C. 1801 et seq.
Dated: July 26, 2024.
Lindsay Fullenkamp,
Acting Director, Office of Sustainable Fisheries, National Marine
Fisheries Service.
[FR Doc. 2024-16902 Filed 7-31-24; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 3510-22-P
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</html>Indexed from Federal Register on August 1, 2024.
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