Fisheries Committee on June 18th, 2013

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

I'll call this meeting to order.

I'd like to thank our officials for being with us again. I appreciate your patience yet again. This is the third attempt. Mr. Stringer said “three times lucky”, and let's hope he's right.

Mr. Stringer, I understand that you have a brief opening statement, after which we'll proceed to questions. I know you're quite familiar with the practices of our committee, so I'll turn the floor over to you at this time.

[Kevin Stringer, Assistant Deputy Minister, Ecosystems and Oceans Science Sector, Department of Fisheries and Oceans]

Thank you very much.

Thank you very much for inviting us. We're very pleased to be here to talk about the lobster fishery in Atlantic Canada and Quebec. It is our largest fishery by participation, as well as by exports and its economic contribution to Canada's fishery.

We understand that the committee wanted to ask some questions around lobsters, specifically around the health of the stocks, and generally about lobster and, potentially, other issues. We're pleased to answer any and all questions to the best of our ability.

I'm joined today by two of my colleagues from Fisheries and Oceans. On my left is Nadia Bouffard. Nadia is the director general for fisheries and aboriginal policy in the program policy sector. On my right is Adam Burns, the director of resource management in the Atlantic region in the ecosystems and fisheries management sector. I'm Kevin Stringer, the assistant deputy minister for ecosystems and oceans science. You have fisheries management, policy, and science here. So hopefully we can address the various questions.

I will, as I said, make a few brief remarks about lobster, about the health of the fishery, and about what we know about the fishery. I'll start with some very basic facts that can provide a bit of grounding.

There are many things that we do know about lobster and there are many things that we are studying still, which I'd be happy to talk about later on. But you do need to know a number of things.

American lobster is unique to the northwest Atlantic Ocean. It occurs from southern Labrador to North Carolina. Some of the things we do know that are really important to help us manage this fishery are that mature lobsters make seasonal movements to shallow waters in the springtime and summer to moult, to reproduce and hatch eggs, and return to deeper waters in the fall and winter. These movements typically amount to a few kilometres. However, longer seasonal movements occur in the Gulf of Maine, the Bay of Fundy, and offshore regions in the Scotian Shelf amounting to tens or hundreds of kilometres. Fishing area 40 is considered to be a bit of an incubation ground. We have that closed and we believe that it actually helps populate some of the other fisheries. These movement patterns are affected by bottom topography, depth, water temperature, and other matters. They have two parts of their life cycle. Again, these are things that are crucial for us to help manage the fishery.

First is a planktonic phase, which follows the hatching of eggs. It happens late May through September depending on where in Atlantic Canada. The larvae go through a free swimming period for three to 10 weeks—which is important, because they're not on the bottom at the beginning—depending on the environmental conditions, mostly the water temperature. It ends when they settle on the bottom. What is important to note is that natural mortality is highest during these first few weeks of the lobster's life due to predation and currents. The currents may carry the larvae to unfavourable habitats. So, predation, storms, climate change, and other things have an impact, particularly in the early stages of the lobster's life.

Then there's the benthic phase. The newly settled lobster progresses through several stages before reaching adulthood of four to 10 years. It's usually eight years in most parts of Atlantic Canada. A lobster has to survive eight years to reach maturity and to the point where it is recruited into the fishery. That's a long period of time. Predation is highest when it's small. It mostly hides out and comes out more and more as it gets older and moults more. Natural mortality is high due to predation mostly when they first develop in the benthic phase and as they emerge as juveniles from their first shelters.

I have just a couple of other points around this, again related to how we manage the fisheries. There's information to support the management of fisheries. Lobsters grow through moulting. They moult their shells. They do it multiple times. They grow as much as 12, 15, 16 per cent with different moults. They are strongly influenced by temperature, which is why they want to be in warm water for moulting because it's more likely to happen and there's going to be more growth. There are other things that influence it as well.

Mating occurs just after females molt, between July and September in Atlantic Canada. The female lobster has an almost two-year gestation period. It extrudes eggs for approximately one year. The number of eggs produced by a female lobster increases with size, so we have some protection for larger females. That's why we have some maximum size limits, as well as minimum size limits. The eggs are carried in clutches on the underside of the female's abdomen, called a berried female, for the last 9 to 12 months. That's why we have protection for berried females as well.

Now, for a little bit about the state of the stocks, how are the stocks doing in Atlantic Canada and Quebec?

In Atlantic Canada and Quebec, lobster fishing is usually managed through the control of inputs—such as the number of permits, gear restrictions and seasons. I want to point out the following exception: Nova Scotia offshore lobster fishing—in lobster fishing area 41—is managed on the basis of total allowable catches.

In addition, landings currently constitute the primary parameter used to ensure the monitoring of the state of lobster resources and related trends. In lobster fishing areas of the Maritimes, Cape Breton and Fundy Bay regions, landings are increasing or stable—reaching record highs or nearly reaching them.

The landings are high in those areas and high in other areas as well.

I'll speak to the other areas. The southern Gulf of the St. Lawrence LFAs, lobster fishing areas, which include P.E.I., New Brunswick, as well as the southern part of Gaspé and the Magdalen Islands in Quebec, also show stable or increased landings. The areas around P.E.I. and New Brunswick, in particular, have high abundance or are at near historical levels. Landings in the northern gulf have generally been stable since 2008, at a low level on the north shore of Quebec, and high abundance at Anticosti Island. However, areas 13 and 14, located on the west coast of Newfoundland, have shown a decline since 2008, albeit they have in fact increased in the last year.

For the other lobster fishing areas around Newfoundland and Labrador, we've seen an increase in landings on the south coast since the late-nineties. However, the northeast coast landings, those in the Avalon, have been declining since the early-nineties, but the fishery has not been substantial in that area.

As I mentioned before, the offshore Nova Scotia lobster fishery is the only lobster fishery in Canada managed with the total allowable catch. The current total allowable catch is 720 tonnes. It's been in place since 1985 and we believe the stock has been stable since 1999.

Of note, as I mentioned already, is lobster fishing area 40, located off southwest Nova Scotia. It's closed to lobster fishing because it is known to be a spawning area, where large females congregate. The area was closed because of its potential conservation benefits. We believe it is in fact a bit of an incubation area for many of the fisheries, particularly in southwest Nova Scotia.

Overall, the stocks are in good shape, and some would say “remarkably good” shape. We acknowledge that has created significant challenges in other areas, which are being dealt with by fishers. There are different views about why the lobster fishery has done as well as it has since the 1990s. It really has grown exponentially in some areas.

The views generally come down to three or four different factors—three factors anyway. One is favourable environmental conditions, temperature in particular, but the second is lack of predation. We know that the predators of lobsters, particularly at a young age—cod, cusk, white hake, sculpin, and others—are not in great shape, so lack of predation we think is a factor. The other factor is the management controls that we've established. We've always had management controls, but they've actually increased significantly over the last number of years.

I'll just touch on those management controls. There are three basic controls. The first is the specific season, meaning that you can only fish at certain times of the year. The second is limited entry, with only certain people licensed to do it. And the third is trap limits, with only x number of traps being allowed.

In addition, we have rules for conservation in various fisheries. There is a minimum carapace size, which means you can't keep a lobster larger than a certain carapace size. There's a prohibition on landing egg-bearing females and v-notched females. We get the fishermen to put a v-notch on the tails of egg-bearing females so we can recognize them in the future.

Some of them, as I said, have a maximum size, so we're protecting the larger females. There are vents to allow for the escape of sublegal sizes in the traps. And there are biodegradable traps, which are a new development that ensures the traps that are cut aren't catching fish forever.

Those are things we've done that we think speak to why the stocks are in as good a shape as they are.

We remain concerned and vigilant. The exploitation rate in some of these fisheries is high, but they continue to do well. We're concerned about that, and we continue to do research to better understand lobster. If you look at our science website, you will see studies that we've done in recent years, and the assessments of all the LFAs. We do those assessments regularly. They've all been done in the last year and, as I said, they mostly point to a healthy stock.

We also do specific studies. We have specific peer-reviewed studies on predation, on bycatch, meaning other species caught in lobster traps; the impact of temperature; the potential impact of ocean acidification; utilization of habitat and preferred habitat; on stomach sampling to see the lobster prey; the impacts of pest and pathogen treatment on lobster; the impact of aquaculture facilities on lobster, and many, many other areas. We do much of this research with fishermen as partners, and we will continue to do that.

There are many challenges in the lobster fishery, and we'd be pleased to talk about those today. But, overall, the health of the stocks at the moment is quite good. There is some concern about the exploitation rates in some of the areas, but the stocks are holding up and we believe that they will continue to do so. If you read the assessments, the immediate future looks quite good for lobster in terms of the stocks.

I'll stop there. We would be happy to take questions.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Thank you very much, Mr. Stringer.

We'll move into our seven-minute round at this point, and we'll start with Mr. Kamp.

[Randy Kamp, Conservative, Pitt Meadows—Maple Ridge—Mission, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, lady and gentlemen, for being with us today. I know it has taken a while to get this meeting to happen, so I appreciate your patience.

Let me start with a two-part question and give you some time to answer. Then if I have time, I'll ask a couple more questions.

We had a meeting with Geoff Irvine of the Lobster Council of Canada. There was a sense among most members on the committee that there was something that could be called a “crisis” in the lobster industry, primarily related to pricing but perhaps other matters as well.

He said that the one thing the federal government could do would be to support the development of what he called a “levy system”, to fund promotion and structural reform efforts. Those were his words. In his view, because the federal government collects licence fees and has that jurisdiction over harvesters, if there were a way to have a surcharge or a levy on the licence fee, that could go towards a fund. The Lobster Council could use that fund to engage in marketing activities primarily, and perhaps other activities as well. He felt that would be very significant to getting them into a better place in the future.

This is my two-part question. First, do you agree that there is an ongoing crisis, and if so, how would you characterize that crisis? Second, is this idea of a levy something that needs to be considered, or has the department considered it already? Are there some significant reasons that it's not possible? Would it require the User Fees Act and so on?

Let me begin with that, if I could.

[Kevin Stringer]

I'll ask Adam to speak to the issue of the first part of the question, which is whether there is a crisis and how we would characterize it, and Nadia can speak to the issue of a potential levy.

[Adam Burns, Director, Resource Management, Atlantic Region, Ecosystems and Fisheries Management Sector, Department of Fisheries and Oceans]

Thanks, Mr. Kamp, and thanks to Kevin.

What I would say about what is going on in the lobster fishery right now from an economic perspective—a price perspective and so on—is that the department is focused on working with harvesters throughout Atlantic Canada and Quebec to put in place measures that will help increase the economic prosperity of the fisheries in their areas.

We're open to working with them in a number of ways, in a manner built upon industry's coming to the department with their ideas of how we should be moving forward. At the end of the day, it's their fishery and their enterprises that are impacted by the measures we put in place.

We've been doing this for a number of years. We can look back to the Atlantic lobster sustainability measures program, which was very successful in reducing effort in the fishery throughout Atlantic Canada and in promoting significant improvements in sustainability in the fishing areas that participated in the program. There are lots of things that the department can point to as measures we have undertaken and steps we have made in working in partnership with the industry.

There's no doubt that prices are low and there's no doubt that there are challenges, not just in this fishery but as a result of the global economy. We're very open to working with the industry to implement things that would benefit them and help them operate in the current global context.

[Randy Kamp, Conservative, Pitt Meadows—Maple Ridge—Mission, BC]

Do you characterize this as a crisis in the industry at the moment?

[Adam Burns]

I don't think we have used the term “crisis” per se. I think that it's a challenging time with respect to price and market demand and market supply. Whether or not it's a crisis isn't as important, I guess I could say, as the fact that the department is working actively with the industry to address the challenges they are facing. We could put any sort of word that we wanted to what is going on. It's a challenging time, and we're focused on dealing with it.

[Randy Kamp, Conservative, Pitt Meadows—Maple Ridge—Mission, BC]

If supply is the big part of the problem, then that gets us to the second part of the question. They would like to develop new markets and so on, and to do that they need more money, according to him. The levy would help them, in his view.

Is it possible or not?

[Nadia Bouffard, Director General, Fisheries and Aboriginal Policy, Program Policy Sector, Department of Fisheries and Oceans]

Before answering the specific question, I think it's important to note that the provinces and the federal government worked together to help establish the council. We provided some start-up funding to support the Lobster Council in the amount of $90,000 since 2009.

We at Fisheries and Oceans Canada have been clear with the council that this was start-up funding, with a view to the council's working with its members—the lobster industry, on both the harvesting and the processing side—to come up with some mechanism for taxing their members and getting some funding for the organization.

The issue of the levy itself is not a concept we have thoroughly reviewed, so my comments today are really preliminary views.

The matter of collecting fees from members is really up to an organization and its members. Off the top of my head, there are a couple of ways you could secure that funding. You could either do it through contracts or agreements with your members or you could do it through legislation. The Lobster Council would need to seek some advice to determine the best way for it to proceed to get that membership due.

It would seem impractical to go the contract or agreement route, given that there are 10,000 fishing enterprises across Atlantic Canada and Quebec. As far as I know, there is no federal legislation that enables the collection of the levy from the Lobster Council members to be provided to the Lobster Council. There certainly aren't any provisions in the Fisheries Act, under Fisheries and Oceans Canada, that will allow that kind of levy or fee.

It's not immediately obvious either that this kind of levy would fit within the mandate and core role of the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, which is to manage and control fisheries. In fact, it may be more clearly linked to the provinces' roles with respect to marketing seafood across Canada and outside Canada.

Having the government adopt legislation to collect those fees sounds a bit like a tax. If we were to look into this, we would need to look at it in that context.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Thank you very much.

Thank you, Mr. Kamp. Your time is up.

Mr. Chisholm.

[Robert Chisholm, NDP, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

We're pleased to have officials here to talk with us, finally—through no fault of yours—and to speak with us a bit about an issue that's very important to the members of the committee, and certainly to me as a member of Parliament from Nova Scotia, as it relates to the current status of the lobster fishery.

It's been another difficult spring, with a lot of things going on. It appears pretty obvious, and you've confirmed this, that the catch sizes not only continue to maintain but continue to grow. The problem appears to be related to price or supply and demand, whichever you want to put first. The bottom line is the price that the fishermen are getting. Undoubtedly the processors have similar complaints.

Some would suggest that one part of this puzzle is the whole question of carapace size as it relates to conservation and as it relates to supply. Some of the different LFAs and associations are trying to deal with that issue themselves.

As recently as about three weeks ago, I think it was LFA 26A or B that requested from the director general an immediate increase in order to get at some of that problem. That was turned down, for reasons that I guess made some sense, but it's an indication of how a majority of the fishermen believe a clear answer to the question of price is to get at the issue of supply and quality.

I want to ask for your comments on that, and also on another point. It's been suggested by some in the industry that the Department of Fisheries and Oceans has the authority to increase carapace size, taking into consideration a majority position within the industry. The question has been asked, would you consider increasing the carapace size by two millimetres in 2014?

[Kevin Stringer]

Let me start, and then I'll ask Adam to make further comment on the specifics.

I'll start by talking about carapace size and the department's concern, from a conservation perspective, in ensuring that there's sufficient lobster for the future.

We have a concept called “SOM50”, which stands for “size at the onset of maturity”. We do science work that determines at what size a female lobster is mature on average, and 50% of the females are mature at a certain size.

That's our primary issue regarding carapace size. We set a carapace-size estimate. It's different in different parts of the fishery, but it ranges from the low seventies in terms of centimetres to around 100. The advice we provide to fisheries management is that it would be wise to allow at least 50% of the females to get to a mature state so that we're providing eggs for future fisheries.

That's sort of a bottom line with respect to fisheries management. Then, if you want to go higher, it's largely a decision about markets and about industry: what the markets want, fishing to the market, etc.

So we start with a conservation piece, and then we deal with industry generally in terms of what the wants and needs are.

I'll ask Adam to speak to that.

[Adam Burns]

Thanks.

That's absolutely right. In terms of reaching an agreement amongst industry to increase the carapace size, the department's very open to the participants of the fishery in the various areas. If they come together with a desire to increase the minimum carapace size for those economic reasons, we're very open to that.

In the particular case of LFA 26B, I believe it was, there wasn't consent of all of the harvesters in that LFA. I believe that, combined with the fact that it was mid-season, did play a role in the decision in the region to not go forward with that carapace-size increase mid-season.

[Robert Chisholm, NDP, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

So it has to be all of them?

[Adam Burns]

Certainly we're looking for strong consent. I wouldn't say it's written anywhere that it has to be all of them.

[Robert Chisholm, NDP, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

It doesn't work that way here.

[Adam Burns]

I realize that, but in this particular case, all I can tell you is that those, I think, were the factors that were at play. We're very open, as a department, to harvesters coming together and presenting the department with a request to increase the minimum carapace size in their area. In the case of LFA 26B, the minimum carapace size is at or above SOM50 already.

[Robert Chisholm, NDP, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

If I can just focus on that point a little bit, Mr. Burns—because it does get at how we're ever going to get some standardization in the 26B region—I believe that more than 90% of fishermen who voted, voted in favour of an increase in carapace size. Where I come from, that's huge. In this place and other democratic organizations, the majority rules.

[Adam Burns]

I think that the communication from the region to the harvesters in that area was that it was more appropriate for this discussion to occur at the start of the fishing season. Harvesters make their plans for how the fishery will unfold. They make their plans related to where they'll be selling their lobsters and so on and so forth. But certainly, I agree with you that 90% is a lot of people. That's certainly a discussion they'll be having in advance of the 2014 season, as you mentioned.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chisholm.

Mr. Allen.

[Mike Allen, Conservative, Tobique—Mactaquac, NB]

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you to our witnesses for being here.

Ms. Bouffard, I just want to follow up on one of the questions. Mr. Kamp was talking about the levy. Would that require legislative change, such as changing the User Fees Act or anything, if the levy were actually introduced?

[Nadia Bouffard]

I was going to say that I'm not a lawyer. I am a lawyer, but I'm not a lawyer in the federal government.

[Mike Allen, Conservative, Tobique—Mactaquac, NB]

Neither am I.

[Nadia Bouffard]

More clearly, we've not done a full assessment of this, so I can't give you a straight answer as to whether it would require an amendment. Clearly, when you look at the Fisheries Act, currently there is no authority to enable that levy.