It conserves and manages fisheries to promote sustainability and prevent lost economic potential associated with overfishing, declining species, and degraded habitats.

[4] This structure remained through the transition of the commission's placement within the U.S. Commerce Department's National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), in 1970.

[4] Initially the commission investigated the reasons for an apparent decline in fish stocks along the shores of southern New England and recommended regulatory measures.

[7] The commission also conducted broad, scientific surveys and collections of marine species from scientific research vessels, initially in Northeast Atlantic coastal and deep-sea waters and then in the Mid-Atlantic and South Atlantic, the Gulf of Mexico, and off the coasts of Mexico, Texas, Florida, and Cuba.

[17][18] Established in 1976, the MSA is the primary law governing marine fisheries conservation and management in U.S. federal waters.

[21] These councils serve as regulatory advisors that make region-specific recommendations to NOAA Fisheries, who implements the regulations.

[22] Overfishing, which NOAA Fisheries is tasked with preventing, is a major threat to biodiversity, global food security, and the fishing sector.

[26] NOAA Fisheries has been successful at ending overfishing in U.S. waters, and science-based management has resulted in 47 once-overfished U.S. fish stocks being declared rebuilt.

[30] Greater transparency and traceability helps NOAA enforcement agents locate and block IUU seafood imports from entering U.S.

[32] The program also develops product grade standards, specifications, and international policies, and provides training and education within the industry and for consumers.

Fishery observers are trained biologists who collect data on fishing activities onboard commercial vessels in support of science and management programs.

[33] They collect a variety of data including catch, bycatch, fishing effort, biological characteristics, interactions with protected species, and socioeconomic information.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Fisheries Office of Law Enforcement is based in Silver Spring, Maryland.

In 2007, the NMFS issued regulations to protect endangered whales from fatal fishing-gear entanglements after environmental groups sued to force action on the rules, which were proposed in early 2005.

NMFS seeks the submission of proposals addressing Marine Animal Entanglement Response in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.

The Alaska Fisheries Science Center is located on the grounds of the now-closed Naval Station Puget Sound.

[56] In 2013, a large facility on La Jolla Shores Drive was built by the architects Gould Evans, replacing an older building that was threatened by coastal erosion.

Designers say the building is specially articulated so that it should stay intact as the bluff falls from underneath its seaward end.

[61] Although Balcomb documented infections where barbs had failed to detach on killer whales and presented his findings to the NMFS,[61] the NMFS site read years later in October 2016, "Our experience with previous occurrences of tag attachment failure has shown no impact to the whale’s general health.

[64] This article incorporates public domain material from websites or documents of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.