Ban on Arctic FishingApproved by U.S. Fisheries Agency

Concerned about rapidly disappearing Arctic sea ice and warming ocean waters, the North Pacific Fishery Management Council has voted to prohibit commercial fishing in a 200,000 square-mile area in the Arctic Ocean north of Alaska. The unanimous vote represents the first fisheries ban ever imposed because of the environmental effects of global warming. No industrial-scale fishing has yet taken place in the vast ocean territory, but with summer Arctic sea ice melting rapidly, the federal regulators voted to close the region — which stretches  from the Bering Sea east to the Canadian border — to fishing. The closure covers the so-called Exclusive Economic Zone, or EEZ, which extends 200 miles offshore and encompasses an area that contains stocks of cod, king crab, and other prized fish species. The ban is designed to halt fishing until biologists can study its potential impact.