Pangasius catfish and tilapia, both relatively inexpensive farmed products, are also a substantial part of the overall multi-million dollar groundfish market.

That's close to the 12 million metric tons of cod and pollock that made up the bulk of the global seafood industry 25 years ago, said John Sackton, editor and publisher of the international fisheries Web site Seafood.com.

"This is a change from the years when the rapid growth of farmed salmon seemed to eclipse whitefish," he noted on his Web site on Oct. 23.

Sackton referred to global stock analysis figures provided by Henry Demone, chairman of the Groundfish Forum, a global organization that includes some of the leading seafood companies. The Groundfish Forum, now in its 18th year, met recently in Reykjavik, Iceland. The group is dominated by North Atlantic whitefish producers, who gather to make a collective estimate of upcoming global supply.

Projecting from 2008 to 2010, global cod supplies have increased 18 percent since 2007, while pangasius and tilapia supplies have increased about 16 percent, Sackton said. Much of that cod is coming from a Brent Sea fishery - the largest cod stock in the world - jointly managed by fisheries officials in Norway and Russia, he said.

"This has added 817,000 metric tons to global whitefish supplies, the equivalent of an entirely new Alaska pollock fishery," he said.

For Alaska pollock, which the Groundfish Forum estimates at 900,000 metric tons for the U.S. in 2010, increases in the Russian quotas will offset the decrease in U.S. landings since 2007, he said. In 2007, Alaska fishermen had a quota of 1.4 million metric tons, but by 2009, that quota had fallen to 815,000 metric tons.

For that same period, 2007-2010, the Russian pollock quotas have increased by about 400,000 metric tons, Sackton said.

"The significance of this surge in whitefish is that it is happening at a time when global production of salmon is stagnant," Sackton wrote. "Atlantic salmon, which reached 1.4 million metric tons in 2007, will fall in 2010 to 1.345 million tons, primarily due to production problems in Chile. The simultaneous growth of both farmed tilapia and pangasius, together with the growth in wild harvests of cod and other groundfish, is a trend that is likely to last several years into the future, meaning that the center of gravity for fish consumption will remain firmly in the whitefish category."

Alaska pollock, the most abundant fish species in the Bering Sea, is harvested with mid-water trawl nets. The bulk of the Alaska pollock is harvested by seven companies that own and operate 19 commercial fishing vessels that catch, process, package and freeze the pollock, all of them member of the trade group At-sea Processors Association.

Landings from the Alaska pollock fishery, the world's largest food fishery, have averaged 2.5 billion pounds annually over the past 30 years, the APA said.

Alaska pollock is used in fish sandwiches, fish sticks, and fish and chips dishes. Almost all of McDonald's fish sandwiches served in North America are made from Alaska pollock.

Pollock roe and surimi a minced product used to make imitation crab products, a delicacy enjoyed by Asian consumers is also produced.

The North Pacific Fishery Management Council will announce during its December meeting in Anchorage the total allowable catch of pollock and other groundfish species that may be harvested within two upcoming fishing periods, from January through April, and from June through October.

The council's harvest allocations are determined each year after considering the trawl survey data of each fishery, along with other scientific evidence gathered by federal fisheries officials.

The scientific process is no simple shot in the dark. It is, in fact, a rather complex one, which begins with the council's groundfish plan team and staff assessing each groundfish stock to determine how much of that stock can be caught and the outside level to which that stock may be fished directly or incidentally to keep the stock sustainable.

The plan team then makes recommendations to the council's scientific and statistical committee, whose members include leading scientists in biology, economics, statistics and social science.

They, in turn, make final recommendations to the council on the acceptable biological catch and overfishing levels. These recommendations establish a limit that the council as a whole cannot exceed in its final recommendations to the Commerce Department, which must approve final recommended harvest limits.

The council as a whole also hears recommendations from its advisory panel, whose membership includes representatives of major sectors of the commercial fishing fleet, observers, consumers, conservationists and sport fishing interests.

The council is mandated to manage for conservation in this sprawling fishery within the U.S. 200-mile exclusive economic zone off the coast of Alaska, so its recommendations on annual catch limits are monitored closely.

Those engaged in the groundfish industry are still trying to determine what this year's fishery will bring, said Gunnar Knapp, a fisheries economist with the University of Alaska Anchorage's Institute of Social and Economic Research.

Knapp said a lot of things affect the price of groundfish, so it's a mistake to look at just one part of the picture.

"The general trend is that the higher-valued products tend to be more affected by a recession," he said. "The more expensive the product, the more likely it is to be affected by the recession."

Other factors may include the supply versus the demand, and exchange rates for overseas sales.

While pollock and Pacific cod are perhaps best known among the general public, Alaska's groundfish fisheries also include a great diversity of species, including sablefish, Atka mackerel, lingcod and numerous rockfish and flatfish species.

Groundfish are found in the Gulf of Alaska, the Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands, and many of the bays, sounds and traits that dissect Alaska's coastline.

The National Marine Fisheries Service, through federal fishery management plans adopted by the North Pacific Fishery Management Council, manages most groundfish fisheries off of the Alaska coast.

The status of groundfish stocks and federally managed fisheries in the Gulf of Alaska, Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands are summarized in annual stock assessment and fishery evaluation reports, known as SAFE reports.

Halibut are not considered a groundfish and are managed by the International Pacific Halibut Commission, which has representatives from both the U.S. and Canada.

In general, the groundfish fisheries that lie within three to 200 miles offshore - an area known as the U.S. Exclusive Economic Zone - fall under federal authority, while the state of Alaska manages groundfish fisheries within three miles of the coastline, within state waters.

For most federal groundfish fisheries, the Alaska Department of Fish and Game issues emergency orders for state waters that duplicate NMFS management actions, although gear and other restrictions may vary.

These emergency orders establish parallel fishing seasons. This allows vessels to fish for groundfish - primarily pacific cod, walleye pollock and Atka mackerel - in state waters with the same seasons as in federal fisheries.

The state may also establish state managed fisheries with separate catch quotas and fishing seasons under state groundfish regulations. When there are federal and parallel fisheries for a species, state waters fishery usually opens after the parallel fishery closes.

Margaret Bauman can be reached at margie.bauman@alaska

journal.com.