The following is a release made by the National Marine Fisheries Service:

February 20, 2013 - On November 26, 2012, we published a proposed rule (77 FR 70552) for draft Amendment 5 to the 2006 Consolidated Highly Migratory Species (HMS) Fishery Management Plan (FMP) based on several shark stock assessments that were completed from 2009 to 2012. As described in the proposed rule, we proposed measures that were designed to reduce fishing mortality and effort in order to rebuild various overfished Atlantic shark species, including dusky sharks, while ensuring that a limited sustainable shark fishery could be maintained consistent with our legal obligation.