Markets & Economic Development Community Leadership Downeast Groundfish Initiative Hatchery Outreach and Education

Our organization is founded on a conviction that the community-based approach to marine resource stewardship is the only way these fishing communities can survive. To that end, our first goal is that fishermen become a voice for the diversity of fisheries and conservation of the eastern Gulf of Maine ecosystem and take responsibility for sustaining its resources. Fisherman stewardship will result in more fish and more opportunity for local small-scale fishing businesses.

Dr. Elinor Ostrom won the 2009 Nobel prize in Economics for her work in common resources. What she famously said about community-based management describes our core philosophy:

"The universal is that rules that are worked out that fit a local forest or fishery or lake or irrigation system are the ones that work the best when they are designed to fit a particular ecology. Where rules don't work is when we try to have all of the fisheries along the entire East Coast with the same rule, because the fisheries from Florida are dramatically different than the fisheries in Maine. So, it's that we have to be thinking about a match between the kind of rules that people are using and the ecology involved."

The Community We Serve

Fishing, be it groundfish or lobster ,is a tremendous part of the heritage of eastern Maine. Penobscot East works in one of the few remaining community based fisheries in the USA, where the traditional culture is still virtually intact and children can expect to grow up and fish the way their great grand-fathers did- in small owner-operated boats going out in the early hours, returning at day's end, six days a week. This way of life and the economy it supports is increasingly in jeopardy.

Penobscot East’s work is in support of this heritage and to secure its future through several multi-faceted programs. These include fishermen leadership development, economic diversification, advocacy for new ecological science and management practices, an initiative to revive the local groundfish economy and the development of seafood marketing channels that deliver a fair price for quality.

Beals Island Fisherman Dwight Carver:

"Just being off on the water and sailing home at night is just such a good feeling, such a rewarding feeling. Unless somebody has done it, they just don't know."

Resource Management

Two decades ago, the groundfish that once defined the natural marine wealth of our inshore waters -the cod, flounder, haddock, hake etc. started to disappear. Overfishing, advanced technology, coastal development, pollution and stricter fisheries regulations that excluded small boats all helped decimate the fish stocks. For reasons not well understood, eastern Gulf of Maine fish have not recovered like those in the southern Gulf of Maine. Out of more than 2,000 fishermen operating in eastern Maine, not a single one is groundfishing. Their livelihoods and the region’s economy are precariously dependent on a single species - lobster.

This region is unique not just in Maine but in the mainland US. It is a stretch of coastline that makes up 43% of the Maine coast, contains 50 coastal fishing communities, and Washington and Hancock counties - the two most fishery-dependent counties on the east coast.

Penobscot East Resource Center believes that communities can responsibly manage our resources and regain access to diverse fisheries as those stocks rebuild.

We work toward this goal with a Community-Based Fisheries Management approach, a philosophy that is widely practiced in other places including Alaska, Thailand, and Mexico. Locally, two good examples are Deer Isle-Stonington Clam Committee and Stonington Fisheries Alliance, started in 1999 to introduce the concept of managing fisheries based on sustainability principles.

Cape Rosier Fisherman Paul Venno:

"Even when the weather is bad, the worst day on

the water is better than the best day on the land!"