Fisheries Committee on April 28th, 2014

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Robert Chisholm]

Okay, we'll call this meeting to order.

As you may know, the chair is on his way here. We expect that his plane will land shortly, it's been delayed. But he'll be along.

This is the first day of our study on changing ocean conditions or other factors off the coast of Newfoundland and Labrador that have led to stock fluctuations in northern shrimp and other species. We've set aside four meetings to begin this process or to deal with this process, and of course, as a committee, we'll see how things go and whether we need more information or more hearings or fewer hearings.

We're going to start off today with officials from the Department of Fisheries and Oceans. Thank you very much, gentlemen, for appearing today. Unless there are any other questions, why don't we get started?

If you want, please begin your presentation. You know the rules. We'll get going and then we'll open things up for questions. Thanks again very much.

[David Gillis, Acting Assistant Deputy Minister, Ecosystems and Oceans Science Sector, Department of Fisheries and Oceans]

Indeed we do.

Thank you Mr. Chairman.

Thank you as well to the committee for inviting the department to contribute to this important discussion and for leading off, actually, with a focus on the underlying science.

My name is Dave Gillis and I'm the assistant deputy minister for science, ecosystem and ocean science at the Department of Fisheries and Oceans. We're here today, a small team—I'll introduce these folks in a minute—to present the knowledge that we have available on the studies of the ecosystem in the Newfoundland shelf and to explain the science basis for the changes that we are observing there with regard to the ocean environment and the more important fishery resources which that ecosystem supports.

So to aid me, I have two folks with me here today. On my right is Jean Landry. Jean is the director general for ecosystem science for the Department of Fisheries at headquarters here in Ottawa. On my left is Dr. Pierre Pepin, who is an ocean scientist from the Newfoundland region and is very familiar with the phenomena that we'll be describing for you here today.

So beginning in another minute or so, I'll ask Dr. Pepin here to make a short presentation, which I understand has been circulated to you in advance. This presentation will actually address all of the questions that are set out in the request to appear. In that, it will summarize the most recent stock assessment for the major northern shrimp management areas on the shelf; synthesize the trends in ocean conditions that we see from our oceans monitoring program and other sources; explain the status of several other key resources, notably the snow crab and Atlantic cod; and as we understand them, review the relationships that we see between those key resources and the changing ocean conditions.

We'll also take a moment at the end to provide the committee with a short look ahead at the key science activities that we will conduct in the foreseeable future that we feel are relevant to these issues. Before we start, I should say that all of the information that will be presented in the deck and discussed here is from published science sources, both from within the department and outside, or it has been peer-reviewed and will be made public very shortly. So it's our latest information that is available on all of these topics.

So I'm now going to turn it over to Dr. Pepin to present the deck, after which we will collectively endeavour to answer as many of your questions as time allows as related to the underlying science for this portion of the ocean.

Pierre.

[Dr. Pierre Pepin, Biomathematician, Science Branch, Newfoundland and Labrador Region, Department of Fisheries and Oceans]

Thank you, Dave.

Thank you, members of the committee, for being here. We greatly appreciate this.

Dave has outlined the presentation for you, so I suggest that you turn to page 3 in your deck. The map there shows the major shrimp fishing areas off the coast of Newfoundland and Labrador, going from northern Labrador all the way to the northern Grand Banks. Although these stocks are genetically not differentiated, they are functionally workable management units that are self-sustaining, and therefore they have internal consistencies in terms of biological characteristics, such as the age and size distribution of the animals within them.

Some exchange does take place in the movement of larvae along the Labrador current, but these areas are self-sustaining.

Three of these areas are assessed through the Canadian science advisory secretariat of DFO, and the southernmost stock in 3L is assessed through NAFO. The purple dots on the graph show the position where, in 2013, most of the fishing activity took place, in water depths of between 150 and 600 metres.

Slide 4 shows the trends in fishable biomass for the four major management units. The stock represented by the purple line, in shrimp fishing area 6, is much more abundant than the others are. That area is off southern Labrador and northern Newfoundland. The other stocks have much lower overall average biomasses.

In the northernmost area—shrimp fishing area 4—the fishable biomass index has basically been on the increase over the last few years, but in 2013, it declined by 21%. This stock is still considered to be in the healthy zone with respect to the precautionary approach framework. In the area off central Labrador—fishing area 5—the fishable biomass index declined substantially, by 48%, in 2013. The stock is still in the healthy zone, but the decline is a cause for concern.

Looking at the next slide, you will see that the most important stock is the one in fishing area 6, which is off southern Labrador and northern Newfoundland. The general trend since 2006 has seen a decline in the fishable biomass for this stock. This trend seems to be continuing, despite some variation. In 2013, the stock declined by 33% from the previous year, and is at the lowest level in the time series. The stock is considered to be in the cautious zone of the PA framework.

Finally, the stock in fishing area 7, which corresponds to the northern Grand Banks and which is represented here by the blue line, was not assessed in 2013, although an update will be provided in the fall of 2014. At the last assessment, the fishable biomass index for this stock had decreased by 48% in 2012. This stock has been in decline since 2007 and is now at the biological limit reference point set by NAFO. It's considered to be in the critical zone. The scientific council of NAFO recommended that no directed fishing occur in this fishing area in 2013, but the fishery commission did not follow that advice.

The next slide shows the distribution of observations that are used to provide an indication of the state of the ocean off Newfoundland. This is for one particular year; however, basically this has been recurring every year. The surveys in the region consist of a series of oceanographic monitoring surveys that are carried out in the spring, summer, and fall. On those surveys, information concerning the physical, chemical, and biological oceanographic conditions of the region are collected. Ecosystem trawl surveys are also carried out in the spring and fall. Those are represented by the white and black dots.

Last year, in 2013, more than 1,100 trawl sets were carried out over 233 vessel days. These ecosystem surveys provide indices of abundance for commercial and non-commercial fish stocks, as well as other elements of the ecosystem. They also provide information on the state of the environment, because all our trawls are equipped with environmental sensors that provide us with measures of temperature and salinity.

Taking a look at the next slide, the environmental conditions off Newfoundland are assessed by collecting information from a large number of variables. They include information on atmospheric variables, such as precipitation and air temperature; the extent and volume of sea ice; the temperature of the ocean at various levels in the water column; the volume of cold water associated with the core of the Labrador current in the CIL; and also ocean salinity.

These indices are collected at a number of different locations along the coast to give us a sensation, or an impression, of the variability in conditions throughout the region to determine whether the ecosystem, or the physical environment, is responding uniformly or if there are variations depending on which portion of the region you find yourself in. Each one of those time series is expressed in terms of anomalies relative to the average conditions over the 1981 to 2010 period. It's a fairly standard way of standardizing the information from different environmental time series. It's carried out by other agencies as well. These anomalies we sum to give us a composite view of the ocean climate in the region. We get a sense of all the variations, and they give us an impression of whether we're in a warm phase or a cold phase.

The composite index is represented by the yellow dots and the line joining them, but the elements associated with each colour give you a sense of how much variability there is associated with each type of variable that's being included in the index. What you can see from this graph is that since the mid-1990s we've been in a warm phase, and the warmest phase on record since records have been kept in the region. It's also been one of the periods when there's been the least amount of interannual variability. Not only that, but in comparison with other warm periods that have occurred during that century, there are very few anomalies below the normal in any one of the variables.

So the system has responded very much as a whole. We've seen a very consistent change in the region, and it's a very significant change. We expect that trend will continue on for the next decade to decade-and-a-half that we will be in a warm phase, because the ocean environment is determined to a large extent by long-term cycles in atmospheric forcing. This is on top of the changes that are occurring because of climate change. These are significant changes.

Moving to the next slide, the exploitable biomass of snow crab is shown in the top panel. There are three major fishing areas for snow crab off Newfoundland: one on the east coast, one on the south coast, and one on the west coast. By far the more important resource is located on the east coast, where the fishable biomass is considerably higher than in the other areas.

Both trap and trawl surveys have indicated that the exploitable biomass has basically changed relatively little since the mid-2000s. However, the bulk of the biomass seems to be moving into the area of the Grand Banks, or the increase in population on the Grand Banks has been more notable. The areas in 2J and 3K have seen declines, as have areas on the south coast, in 3Ps.

The pre-recruitment biomass index gives you a sense of the biomass that will enter the fishery in the future. In all cases, the indices have been in decline since 2009 and will continue to decline for the next two or three years. We can say this based on the relationship between the survival of young crab, or the productivity of the stock, and the amount of cold water on the continental shelf. The more cold water there is, the better the environment is for crab; the warmer the waters, the worse off the environment is for crab.

Turning to slide 9, you can see, in the top graph, the northern cod spawning stock biomass index relative to the limit reference point, below which the stock is believed to be below a critical level for productivity. Although there's been some significant improvement in the last few years and the stock appears to be on the rebound, its levels are still 82% below the limit reference point.

There are some very positive signs, however. We've seen improved survival; expanding age structures, which means there's more older fish and also younger fish; more cod in the offshore areas; and more cod in the north.

There is a sign of rebuilding there, and it's an encouraging one.

The recruitment levels have also been at the best levels since the onset of the moratorium in the early 1990s. However, the recruitment levels are far below the recruitment levels that you can see in the 1980s. Based on this, we expect that the recruitment levels will not contribute significantly to the stock growth in the next few years. They will have an impact but it will not be very substantial. So the outlook is for the stock to remain in the critical zone for the next one to three years.

The effect of environmental change on the animals that we're working on is very different, depending on which species you're looking at.

In the case of snow crab, warm conditions negatively impact on the young crab and therefore affect recruitment in a negative sense. The more warm water there is, the poorer the recruitment in crab.

In the case of northern shrimp, the relationship with environmental temperatures is much less clear. However, there appears to be a very strong relationship with the timing of the onset of the spring phytoplankton bloom. These are lower trophic levels that basically form the base of the food web. We find that if the spring phytoplankton bloom is late, there will be good recruitment in shrimp, whereas if the spring phytoplankton bloom is early there will be poor recruitment in shrimp. There are multiple factors that determine the timing of the onset of the spring phytoplankton bloom. Temperature is one of the factors, but the melt of sea ice and the presence of sea ice are also factors there, and the interannual variabilities among these variables are not necessarily straight forward.

In the case of cod, warmer temperatures will likely improve the conditions for growth and recruitment for the stock. However, other factors, namely the abundance of their primary prey, which is capelin, also need to be favourable for the stock to achieve optimum growth and productivity. We can expect to see increased occurrence of warm summer conditions. Because of that, we're going to see more of the migratory species occur in the region over time, because these animals generally are associated with warm waters and migrate and follow isotherms.

In the case of capelin, we don't have a direct mechanism that links it to environmental variability yet, in terms of productivity of the stock. However, warming conditions are likely to result in good recruitment through earlier spawning times and a better condition of the fish. We can expect that better conditioned fish will produce more eggs, and the timing of spawning releases larvae into the environment at a more appropriate time relative to their life cycle.

If we look at a way forward, DFO will maintain its monitoring programs in terms of its oceanographic and ecosystem surveys of the region. There are also annual shrimp surveys that are done in collaboration with industry, as well as a post-season snow crab trap survey, which is an important index in our region, which is also done in collaboration with industry.

We will complete these assessments as scheduled and we will have a new assessment for northern shrimp on the Grand Banks in September of this year. We'll also see assessments for snow crab and northern shrimp in areas 4 through 6 being carried out next spring. A full assessment of the northern cod stock will be carried out in March 2016. There will probably be an update in 2015.

We're also working on scenarios of possible fluctuations in these key resources in support of economic analysis and for discussion with industry in upcoming consultations. We will, of course, provide advice on the application of the precautionary approach to these resources under our changing oceanographic regime.

In summary, I hope I've given you some evidence that there are some substantial changes taking place on the Newfoundland shelf and on the Grand Banks. We've seen warming oceanographic conditions, the shellfish stocks are in decline, both crab and shrimp. There are some positive signs in the case of northern cod, but the productivity of that stock still remains low. We have no explanation for that right now.

There are a few stocks, such as redfish and yellowtail, that appear to have increased in abundance and rebounded from their very low levels. However, key stocks such as capelin and American plaice are still at low levels

We have a very different ecosystem than the one that was there in the 1960s and 1970s, and that has profound repercussions for what we can expect out of that system.

We will, of course, provide you with further updates on scientific findings as they come up.

Thank you very much.

[David Gillis]

Thank you, Pierre.

Mr. Chair, all I'll say is that this is a fairly broad brush across the very large amount of information that's available underneath all of these points, so hopefully we can answer some of the committee's questions on this over the remaining time.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Robert Chisholm]

Thank you very much.

Were you going to give us a bit of a thumbnail sketch on how the management decisions are made for the stock in that area based on that scientific evidence?

[David Gillis]

Probably we won't go too far into that. We're here principally to talk about the science that underpins our understanding of all of these issues, and the scientific advice that goes to the department to support those decisions.

What I can say is that the information you see in here is part of the regular advisory package that goes to the department from the science sector to inform on all of these issues, and it would have been considered in all of those decisions. But the management process is outside of the science sector, so I'm really not in a position....

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Robert Chisholm]

So the people here don't have any—

[David Gillis]

No, we're all from the science sector in the department. I guess we understood the request to be for information on the underlying science processes that are at play.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Robert Chisholm]

That was certainly part of the question, but it wasn't the only question. Certainly, my understanding, from being part of the committee that discussed the motion that was before us, is that we allowed...not “allowed”—there's a majority on the committee—but we discussed at some length the wording of the motion and talked about the concerns that many of us had, and it was all about, frankly, the decision to allocate the cuts in quota the way it was done. We agreed that we would go at it in this way, but it certainly did not limit...looking at the science, because that was part of the issue that would lead to the need for a reduction. But another part of the committee's concern was how that reduction was being implemented.

Certainly, that was my understanding, as a member of this committee, of some of the information we needed. If you're not prepared to present it and to respond to it, then we're going to have to get other officials back, as far as I'm concerned.

[David Gillis]

I'm sorry, Mr. Chair, if we misunderstood the request. I'm just looking at the wording here, and I see a lot of language that pertains to the underlying science information, the ocean conditions, and understanding how those may be affecting resources. We're certainly well prepared to talk about those issues here today. We understood that to be what the request was focused on for this session.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Robert Chisholm]

There may be members of the committee who are going to direct questions that stem from the actions that were taken, that stem from the scientific conclusions that you reached. If you're not able to answer them, then we'll have to get people from your department who can answer those questions. They certainly do relate to the circumstances and the impact of the science as it relates to that stock, and the decisions that followed. The question of that impact is of concern to me, certainly, as a member of this committee, and as I understood from our conversation, to other members of the committee.

Thank you, Mr. Gillis, and to your colleagues, Mr. Pepin and Mr. Landry. I guess you'll add to this conversation as we go along.

Mr. Cleary, would you like to begin?

[Ryan Cleary, NDP, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to the witnesses appearing before the committee.

What this committee is studying is the changing ocean conditions or other factors off the coast of Newfoundland and Labrador that led to stock fluctuations in northern shrimp and other species.

I was a fisheries journalist for a lot of years. In the early 1990s when the commercial fisheries were closed off Newfoundland and Labrador, I was the fisheries reporter for the daily newspaper, The Telegram, in St. John's, Newfoundland. I remember the talk of the day. There was some scientific talk about the impact that changing oceanographic conditions had on commercial groundfish stocks. A lot of people saw that as a deflection. It was DFO's way of deflecting attention away from its mismanagement, the science that wasn't there, deflecting attention away from that toward changing ocean conditions.

A lot of people say that what led to the collapse of groundfish stocks, such as cod, such as flounder, was pure overfishing, was pure mismanagement, and was lack of science. So when I sit here today and I hear your testimony about how changing ocean conditions are having an impact on crab and shrimp, I shake my head.

We're looking at this question of the impact of changing ocean conditions or other factors. Let me ask you a question about these other factors.

Now I realize that you're biased in terms of where you come from with the department. But what role did inadequate science—if there was inadequate science—have in this? What role did poor management have in the decline of stocks such as shrimp?

I have a second part to that question. Considering DFO's success—or should I say lack of success—when it comes to anything in terms of commercial stocks off Newfoundland and Labrador, should there be, in your scientific opinion, an independent, outside analysis of DFO's science and management?

I think that's a fair question to ask.

So there are two parts to the question. Maybe you can address the first part first.

[David Gillis]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, member, for the question.

There's always a bit of uncertainty in any scientific advice. We're trying to measure what's going on in a natural system that has its own variabilities. But in this case we're quite confident about the advice and the information that we're sharing here today. We have been assessing the northern shrimp stocks—all of these stocks, really—for many years. We have well-established procedures for monitoring and collecting the information that contributes to the assessment of their abundance. In recent times certainly our monitoring efforts have been very successful in that they are operationally complete. We haven't missed large parts of the season for doing our monitoring activities.

Given all of that, and the fact that the results that we see are not new, they are a continuation of a trend year over year, we're reasonably comfortable with the stock assessment that we see in all three of these cases, and we stand by the scientific advice that we have provided to the department for their consideration in management decision-making.

For the reasons that we just mentioned, it wouldn't be my place to make comments on the management process. We contribute our science advice into that management process, and I can certainly assure the committee that all of the information that we had that was relevant was available to the management decision-making process in the department. But I probably can't say very much more than that on that issue.

With regard to an independent review, from the inside of the department, for the reasons that I just outlined a moment ago, we're confident in the signal that we see coming from these resources, and we're comfortable with the advice that we've provided. From inside the department we would not see any compelling reason that we would need to have an independent, full assessment.

I would say that in doing our science, the end step in the process is to take all of the calculations and the analysis that we have done, and subject it to a peer review. This is a process that brings in other scientists other than the ones who have been principally responsible for doing the work. We put out all of our information and our calculations in front of them, and they're analyzed and picked apart and verified until the room is comfortable that we have the best analysis, the best interpretation, and therefore the best advice that's available. That process routinely includes people from other places in our department, but also outside the department, including the industry in many cases.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Robert Chisholm]

Mr. Cleary, if I may, I'm going to interject and I'll give your time back.

Mr. Gillis, just looking at the question that was sent to your officials, to your department, it more fully specifies the motion that the study include a review of the Department of Fisheries and Oceans' science related to the fishing industry and conservation management measures.

[David Gillis]

Yes, I see that at the bottom.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Robert Chisholm]

We want to talk to you about conservation management measures, like reduction in quota, allocation of that reduction—

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

On a point of order, Mr. Chair, whatever the reason—and you can keep beating him up on this—they've said that they're not prepared to answer these. They're scientists; they're not managers.

If I understand correctly, we have a subcommittee meeting following this meeting where we can talk about who or what we need to carry on, but let's not keep bringing this issue up with these witnesses.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Robert Chisholm]

I appreciate your point. I don't consider it a point of order, Mr. Kamp, but I think you make an interesting point.

What I wanted to do, as the chair, was to be clear what the officials had been asked.

We invited the officials and we didn't just invite them to come and give us science. We invited them to also come and prepare to deal with conservation management questions. I just want to make sure that they leave here understanding that, and that other members of the committee understand that's going to be part of this study. That was the only point I wanted to make and I won't belabour it further. I'll turn it back over to Mr. Cleary.

[Ryan Cleary, NDP, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

The cuts to the shrimp quotas off Newfoundland and Labrador are going to have a devastating impact on Newfoundland and Labrador fishermen, on our inshore fishermen, and on our plants. You're talking about more than 3,000 direct jobs in terms of fishermen and plants. In the economy as a whole, I think that the shrimp fishery alone was worth one-third of the landed value of the 2013 fishery.

The question that I have is in regard to the inshore sector and the fishing technology for the inshore sector versus the offshore. Is there a difference?

Because the cuts are so lopsided, the inshore sector has borne the brunt, and again, the impact on our rural economy will be absolutely devastating. Is there a major difference in the technology between the inshore and the offshore, and was that a factor in the decision to have such a lopsided cut to the inshore versus the offshore?

[David Gillis]

I may turn to Dr. Pepin here in a second to verify what I'm going to say, but from a science point of view, my understanding of this fishery is fairly clear. It's all mobile gear that's used in this fishery. This is a trawler-based fishery. There are differences between the sizes of the vessels but in the basic technology I would say no.

I'm tempted to say that from a scientific point of view there would be no difference, and certainly that wouldn't have been a factor that we would have provided advice on in our scientific advice. It would have been based on the abundance and the trends in abundance in the stock.

I'll ask Pierre if he has anything to add to that.

[Dr. Pierre Pepin]

No, it's actually quite accurate.

Both the inshore and the offshore fleets use mobile gear. They're essentially shrimp trawls. The capacity of the offshore and the inshore vessels, in terms of their catch per unit effort, might be slightly different. I'm pretty sure that in fact they are separated out in terms of looking for corresponding indices of abundance. But they are not treated in any way differently and they do not appear to have any differential impact in terms of impacting the stock in indirect ways in terms of the biology of the animals we're concerned with.

[Ryan Cleary, NDP, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

Mr. Gillis, I have another question for you.

In answer to an earlier question I asked, you talked about an amount of uncertainty. I remember in the early 1990s, DFO admitted that it could be off by as much as 25% either way in terms of stock predictions.

Is that 25% either way figure accurate today as well?

[David Gillis]

I'd have to verify the exact estimates or the exact confidence intervals on these estimates. Again, maybe Pierre can help us.

That type of range wouldn't be unusual. We're measuring something that is over a vast ocean area and is a bit of a moving target to start with. But it is a very standard part of the way we do and present our science. We present our best estimates, but we also provide an indication of what the certainty is around those. We can provide the exact figures if you wish.

[Ryan Cleary, NDP, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

I'm sorry to interrupt, Mr. Gillis. I just have a few seconds left so I want to get one last question in.

In answer to my previous question as well, for an independent assessment of DFO, you mentioned how basically.... Your answer was that the science looked good, realizing that you are biased in giving that answer. You couldn't comment on the management.

Has there been a substantial change in the management structure at DFO, since the early 1990s, given your lack of success in managing various commercial stocks? Has there been a substantial change in your management structure?

[David Gillis]

Again, if you mean the physical structure of the department and how we're organized—