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News & Analysis | REG•WATCH Blog | Press Room
Wednesday, June 29, 2005
Sinking science at oceans agency
Politicos are editing or suppressing scientific conclusions about fisheries and marine wildlife, according to a survey of agency scientists conducted by PEER and Union of Concerned Scientists:
A strong majority (58%) said they know of cases in which high-level Commerce Department appointees or managers “have inappropriately altered NOAA Fisheries determinations”; and more than half of all respondents (53%) are aware of cases in which “commercial interests have inappropriately induced the reversal or withdrawal of NOAA Fisheries scientific conclusions or decisions through political intervention”; and only one-quarter of the scientists say they “trust NOAA Fisheries decision makers to make decisions that will protect marine resources and ecosystems.” The political pressure is also reflected in the agency’s scientific and technical output:
More than one third of respondents working on such issues (37%) have “been directed, for non-scientific reasons, to refrain from making findings that are protective” of marine life; and nearly one in four (24%) of those conducting such work reported being “directed to inappropriately exclude or alter technical information from a NOAA Fisheries scientific document.”
More info here.
Posted by Robert Shull
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