# North Pacific Observer Fund

**Agency:** Commerce  
**Account:** North Pacific Observer Fund  
**Source document:** National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration · p. 403  
**Vintage:** President's Budget PB2027  
**Canonical URL:** https://hitchintel.com/budget/commerce/north-pacific-observer-fund  

> **Trust:** parsed from the agency Congressional Justification. Approximate, **not summable**, verify at the cited page.

## Funding ($M)

| Fiscal year | Basis | Amount |
| --- | --- | --- |
| FY2026 | enacted | 4.9 |
| FY2027 | request | 5.0 |

## Commerce discretionary budget authority (OMB PBDB — authoritative)

FY2027 $7.00B, FY2026 $11.90B. This is the agency total, not a sum of the parsed lines.


## What this funds

For FY 2027, NMFS estimates obligating $5,000 for the North Pacific Observer Fund. To fund observer coverage on the vessels and processors in the partial coverage category within the North Pacific Groundfish On January 1, 2013, the restructured NPGOP went into effect and made important changes to how observers are deployed, how observer coverage is funded, and the vessels and processors that must have some or all of their operations observed. ' Collect catch data onboard fishing vessels and onshore processing plants that is used for in-season management and scientific purposes such as stock assessments and ecosystem studies ' Ensure that the data collected by observers is of the highest quality possible by implementing rigorous quality control and Coverage levels are no longer based on vessel length and processing volume; rather, NMFS now has the flexibility to decide when and where to deploy observers based on a scientifically defensible deployment plan. The new observer program places all vessels and processors in the groundfish and halibut fisheries off Alaska into one of two observer coverage categories: (1) full coverage category and (2) partial coverage Vessels and processors in the full coverage category (100 percent observer coverage) will obtain observers by contracting directly with observer providers. Vessels and processors in the full observer coverage category are required to have at least one observer at all times. This will represent no change from the status quo for participants in the full coverage category. Vessels and processors in the partial coverage category (<100 percent observer coverage) will no longer contract independently with an observer provider and will be required to carry an observer when they are selected through the Observer


**Where it sits:** Civilian / Non-Defense › Commerce › National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration › North Pacific Observer Fund › North Pacific Observer Fund


*HitchAI is an independent intelligence service, not affiliated with the U.S. government. Civilian line dollars are parsed from agency Congressional Justifications and are approximate.*