Fisheries of the Exclusive Economic Zone Off Alaska; Removing the Processing Restrictions on Incidentally Caught Squid and Sculpin Species in the Gulf of Alaska and Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands Groundfish Fisheries

NMFS issues regulations to remove the regulatory restriction that limits processing of squids and sculpins to fishmeal only. This final rule is necessary to allow the processing and sale of squids and sculpins as products other than fishmeal and thereby to help prevent waste of the incidental catch of these ecosystem component (EC) species. This final rule is intended to promote the goals and objectives of the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act (Magnuson-Stevens Act), the Fishery Management Plans (FMP) for Groundfish of the Gulf of Alaska (GOA) and Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands Management Area (BSAI) (Groundfish FMPs), and other applicable laws.