Va. General Assembly delays vote on fishery study funding
HAMPTON ROADS, Va. (WAVY) — In January, the Virginia General Assembly delayed a vote on House Bill 19, which would have funded a study to be conducted by the Virginia Marine Resource Commission (VMRC) and Virginia Institute of Marine Science (VIMS) on the menhaden fishery in Virginia.
Menhaden are a small silvery fish that are often not harvested for their meat, but to be ground down into oil and fish meal. The fish are an important part of the diet of hundreds of other marine animals in the Chesapeake Bay.
“And so what that means is basically they’re out there in the ecosystem to be eaten by other fish, birds and marine mammals.” said Chesapeake Bay Foundation Virginia Executive Director Chris Moore.
The process of reducing fish to oil and fish meal is known as ‘Reduction Fishing’, and the only menhaden reduction plant on the Atlantic coast is operated by Omega Protein out of Reedville.
Every other state on the East Coast has banned the practice.
Omega has made headlines in the past, like in 2022 when they admitted to several fishing nets breaking, spilling thousands of dead fish onto local beaches. Omega has been operating for over 100 years and employs several hundred workers in Virginia. According to the Virginia Public Access Project, they also spent more than $85,000 between 2023 and 2024 lobbying the General Assembly.
“I think they wanted to delay the implementation of this study” Moore said.
When 10 On Your Side asked who “they” were, Moore told us he meant Omega Protein.
“Virginia lands about 70% of the coast wide catch of menhaden,” Moore said. “And a lot of that catch comes from either here in the Chesapeake Bay or very close to the mouth of Chesapeake Bay.
“And we don’t have any data that is specific to the Chesapeake Bay when it comes to how many fish come into the bay each year, how many are then caught and then how many go back and how that affects the ecosystem. And that’s a lot of what this study was pushing for, trying to answer some of those unanswered questions about the health of the population in Chesapeake Bay.”
In a statement issued last December, Omega said “no scientific evidence indicates that [a] portion of the coast-wide menhaden stock in the Bay is declining.”
It cites the lack of data regarding menhaden populations as the reason for this. Omega insists that they support the General Assembly funding the study.
Moore said that even if the study is funded in the 2025 legislative session, it could take years before the results come in and any meaningful change can be made.
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