National Direction Required for Effective Management of America's Fish and Wildlife

GAO conducted a review of specific federal fish and wildlife programs to evaluate the overall effectiveness of federal agencies' management of fish and wildlife resources and habitat to ensure that development activities have the least possible adverse effect on fish and wildlife.

Several laws require federal agencies to seek the advice of the Fish and Wildlife Service on planned activities that may affect fish and wildlife. However, the Service is able to respond to only about half of these requests because of a lack of staff and funds. The Service has not established a priority system to identify and respond to those projects having the worst potential impact on fish and wildlife. Effective management of the National Wildlife Refuge System has been limited because the Service has not provided the needed guidance. The Service is also having problems managing the National Fish Hatchery System. It has not been able to establish and carry out national priorities for identifying which fish species to produce and which hatcheries to operate. Lack of direction and funding limitations contribute to this problem. For example, the National Wildlife Refuge and Fish Hatchery Systems have deteriorated to the point where there is a $650 million new development and rehabilitation backlog. The Service's current policy and attitudes stress conservation and protection of fish and wildlife, and this conflicts with the Animal Damage Control Act's original intent of predator control. The current program has not significantly reduced livestock losses caused by predators. Livestock insurance as an alternative was considered but was not feasible. Thus, managing the newly designated Alaskan federal lands presents a challenge between conservation and development interests.

Recommendations

Our recommendations from this work are listed below with a Contact for more information. Status will change from "In process" to "Open," "Closed - implemented," or "Closed - not implemented" based on our follow up work.

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