Fisheries Committee on June 15th, 2006

[Raynald Blais, Bloc, Gaspésie—Îles-de-la-Madeleine, QC]

What's being done on the Magdalen Islands regarding hunter training? That's fine, in my opinion, because an effort is being made in that direction. Do you intend to ensure it is done that way everywhere?

[Ken Jones]

All the groups plan the way to do it together. The Magdalen Islands hunters conduct a good hunt everywhere. Most of them use hooks or pick axes. According to the experts, there's no problem in using those tools.

[David Bevan]

There is a problem with the number of teams that are not always available for the hunters. They need more people. We're having talks with the hunters to find a way to get boats, captains and support teams for next year. So we have to ensure that the hunters have the required qualifications to take part in the hunt.

[Raynald Blais, Bloc, Gaspésie—Îles-de-la-Madeleine, QC]

Ultimately, with regard to derivative products, mention was made of skins, which are sold at high prices, and oil. Is any research being done? If so, are you assisting it in some way? Is the Department of Fisheries and Oceans making efforts in that area?

[David Bevan]

I don't think so, since we don't have the necessary resources for that. Our responsibility is to ensure that the hunt is sustainable.

[Raynald Blais, Bloc, Gaspésie—Îles-de-la-Madeleine, QC]

That slightly contradicts one of your objectives. Your fourth objective is to “encourage fullest possible use of hunted seals.” So if that's an objective and you don't put the necessary resources into it, that's a contradiction.

[David Bevan]

We previously had to eliminate subsidies for seal meat. So we left it up to the market and the industry to find better ways to use seal products. We don't have the opportunity to do this kind of research. In fact, our responsibility is to ensure the hunt's sustainability and that it is carried out without cruelty. We want to find a way to increase the use of seal products, but we don't have the necessary resources to intervene directly in that regard.

[Raynald Blais, Bloc, Gaspésie—Îles-de-la-Madeleine, QC]

Are you meeting with people from the Department of Foreign Affairs on the subject, continuously or from time to time?

[Ken Jones]

Yes, we have a committee that meets with them every two weeks or every month.

[David Bevan]

Next year we want to increase our activities in Europe.

[Raynald Blais, Bloc, Gaspésie—Îles-de-la-Madeleine, QC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gerald Keddy]

Mr. Manning, we're just coming to the end of our time, so if you could wrap it up we'd appreciate it.

[Fabian Manning, Conservative, Avalon, NL]

I'll ask just a couple of quick questions.

First, on your new licensing criteria, perhaps you would take the opportunity to elaborate on that somewhat--what your plans are in relation to competitive versus individual quotas, and whether you're giving some consideration to an IQ system versus competitive.

Also, in the marketing of our seal products, what role do you play in marketing seal products in other parts of the world?

Third, in relation to the quota that's caught now, when you say you follow through on the processing, where does most of the product end up with regard to our markets?

[David Bevan]

We're considering ways to perhaps go to individual vessel quotas or some other licensing regime to try to eliminate this race to the animals that has caused the quotas to be exceeded in the past number of years. But we're not saying that's how we're going to end up. We have to talk to the industry. We have to consult with them to find out what methods they might consider would be the best to deal with this problem of hails, and being too low or too late, and not having the information at our fingertips on a real-time basis to ensure that we can go to the limit of the quota. Those are things that we haven't come to ground on. We have to consult with the industry, and we are considering a number of those possibilities.

On the issue of marketing, we don't have the marketing capacity we used to have. That capacity was eliminated back in program review days, in the mid-1990s. We don't have it, therefore, for seals, or for fish in general. That rests with Agriculture Canada at this point. There's an individual over there with that responsibility. We don't have that at this point.

And our primary markets, I think, are Russia and China.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gerald Keddy]

Thank you, Mr. Manning.

Perhaps I can ask our witnesses one final question before we suspend and bring on our next witnesses.

I'm not trying to belabour this, but there's been a fair amount of discussion about enforcement and about the accessibility of the front to lobby groups--the American society for the humane treatment of animals, the old offshoots of Greenpeace, and so on. Sea Shepherd is the group I'm primarily thinking of, and Mr. Watson.

What have we done to combat the misinformation that these groups put forth, that we're still harvesting whitecoats, that all seals are clubbed, that seals are being skinned alive? There's some serious misinformation here, and this is damaging to our reputation abroad. It's damaging to the industry. It's damaging to our fishery. It hurts us on just about every front on the international scene.

What is DFO's strategy to deal with obvious lies and a deliberate policy of misinformation by individual groups?

[David Bevan]

We had a pretty successful communications campaign in Canada. We can't convince about 30% of people that this is an acceptable activity, but we have good support in the Canadian context, based on our polling. Where we need to step it up is in the markets in Europe and to some extent in the United States. There we need to look at strategies.

We've worked with Foreign Affairs cooperatively in the last number of years and provided them with packages, etc., but I think we're going to have to consider more action on that front. It's clear, based on our discussions in European parliaments, that our message is not getting through and that the message of the Humane Society of the U.S. is getting through. We have some tremendous misinformation out there regarding the hunt, and we have to consider how to take that on in the international arena at this point.

I think we're doing all right in the Canadian context. Our problem is in Europe in particular, and in some of the other areas, and we're going to have to consider how to fix that.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gerald Keddy]

Respectfully, Mr. Bevan, many of our committee members might disagree with that assessment. All of us get a fair amount of mail from anti-sealing groups around the world. Some of it is not just misinformed, it's threatening. I've been on the receiving end of that myself, and it's certainly not any fun. I'm sure you gentlemen have as well.

Again, respectfully, our message is not getting out. Somehow we have to do a better job. We have to take a more deliberate stand to deal with this campaign of misinformation. It's biased, and it probably verges on the side of illegal in some instances.

But I'm just making that as a comment.

I would like to thank our witnesses. This is a very ongoing issue with the committee, and it's one that we've looked at to do further study on. I very much appreciate your coming here and the forthrightness of your answers. We know we have a lot of work to do in several areas, and we're certainly prepared to engage on it.

I will suspend for a few minutes while our next witnesses come to the table.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gerald Keddy]

Ladies and gentlemen, we'll resume.

Pursuant to Standing Order 108(2), we'll reconvene for our study of the Canadian seal hunt.

We have as witnesses, from the Department of Foreign Affairs, Norbert Kalisch, Director General, European Union, North and West Bureau--you can explain “North and West Bureau”--and Robert Clark, director of the European Union division.

Welcome.

Just before we hear from our witnesses, I would ask our members to put away their BlackBerrys. We all carry them with us, but when we use them in the room...and all of us, including me, are guilty of it sometimes; I see Mr. Cuzner has one in his hand right now. The BlackBerry makes it very difficult for translation services. It causes a constant buzzing in their ears, and a nasty clicking noise. And I know that we all want to stay on the good side of translation so that everything we say is reported accurately.

Norbert and Robert, you have a technical briefing for us. Go ahead, gentlemen.

[Norbert Kalisch, Director General, European Union, North and West Bureau, Department of Foreign Affairs]

Thank you very much.

I'd like to start by thanking the committee for this opportunity to make a short presentation on the latest developments in Europe with regard to the seal hunt.

As you know, the annual seal hunt season in Atlantic Canada continues to attract a lot of media attention and to trigger protests and negative political reactions in Europe. While Canadian authorities explain that the seal hunt is sustainable, humane, strictly enforced, and an important economic and cultural mainstay for coastal communities, many myths continue to circulate.

Dramatic photos of the hunt provoke intense emotional reactions that are circulated by influential NGOs such as the International Fund for Animal Welfare and the Humane Society of the United States. These and other local European NGOs accuse the Canadian government of protecting an unnecessary and cruel practice that's out of step with the caring and respectful image normally projected by Canada.

Increased quotas announced in the three-year management plan in 2003 for the Canadian seal hunt sparked renewed media coverage and protests in the last two years. Public declarations by such personalities as Paul McCartney, Brigitte Bardot, and Pamela Anderson against the seal hunt generated media interest in many European countries.

Despite Canadian efforts to provide and explain the facts, negative and sometimes misleading media coverage continues. Canadian missions in Europe--that is, embassies, consulates, and consulates general--receive tens of thousands of protest letters each year, and are sometimes subjected to various forms of intimidation by local animal rights groups, including threats and damage to embassy properties. This year and last, street protests were fewer and more peaceful than in 2004.

Working in very close support and with direction from Ottawa, particularly from the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade and the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, our missions in Europe have been both proactive and responsive, as circumstances permit, to explain the facts about the seal hunt to the media, the public, and local government officials, who often are in possession of incomplete or outdated information. To assist in these efforts, early in 2005 the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade began organizing advocacy training and briefing workshops for both Canadian and locally engaged embassy personnel responsible for communicating the facts on the seal hunt. Throughout the year, we maintained an efficient virtual network with missions and ensured that consistent messaging was being provided across Europe.

We work in very close collaboration with the Department of Fisheries and Oceans on the production of information and communications tools suitable for European audiences. We have copies here of our brochure, Six facts about Canada's seal hunt.

In consultation with the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, we provide advice and support to missions in dealing with protests, media, and government officials. For example, since the fall of 2004, senior officials from the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, sometimes accompanied by academic specialists, have visited France, Switzerland, Italy, Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands, and the U.K. at our request to make expert presentations on the seal hunt and to respond to questions. These visits are intended to lay down the factual and scientific groundwork in an attempt to encourage a rational discourse to the extent possible.

To complement the experts' visits initiative, in March of this year the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade organized, on a trial basis, a visit to Newfoundland by print journalists writing for newspapers based in the Netherlands, Austria, Germany, Switzerland, and Luxembourg. The opportunity to expose European journalists to the Canadian reality and perspective resulted in reasonably balanced articles.

Concerns regarding the hunt have provoked debates, parliamentary resolutions, special hearings, reports, and draft legislation in national parliaments in Belgium, Austria, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, Italy, and at the Council of Europe. Import bans have so far been proposed in Belgium and the Netherlands. Canada has made its view known that the proposed import bans on Canadian seal products are inconsistent with the Belgian, Dutch, and European Community's obligations under the World Trade Organization agreement.

In commercial terms, imported seal products would compete with the “like” non-seal products that are produced domestically. These trade bans would modify the conditions of competition in the domestic market, since non-seal products could be sold while seal products could not. This would violate the national treatment obligations under the Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade and under the GATT.

In our view, these trade bans would also be more trade-restrictive than necessary to fulfill the legitimate policy objectives. On this basis, the measure is inconsistent with the Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade. The trade bans are inconsistent with the national treatment obligations under the GATT. The general exceptions found in article XX of the GATT would not justify the bans.

For western Europe as a whole, Canadian exports of seal products have grown steadily over the last several years, rising from $550,000 in 2001 to $12.9 million in 2005. The largest single importer is Norway, which imported $6.8 million of seal pelts in 2005. The commercial impact of proposed import measures seems modest at present, but the impact on future exports of Canadian seal pelts to Europe remains difficult to estimate. So far in Europe, there have not been any successful moves to boycott Canadian products in general.

I understand that this committee has decided to undertake a mission to Europe in the fall of this year. I am here to assure you of my department's fullest support toward the success of your mission. We should be realistic, however, in terms of what we can expect to be able to achieve. European parliaments take action because sectors of public opinion in these countries are very strongly against the seal hunt, and parliamentarians believe they would be representing their constituents' interests in banning seal products. Public opinion is not necessarily well informed, and this could be at the core of the message you could convey to your European counterparts.

This is not a battle that we are likely to win in the court of public opinion or on the front pages of newspapers. Our goal is to set the record straight and limit misinformation. Since there are many misconceptions around Canada's seal hunt, we would also recommend that your visit, your mission, include an expert who could respond with a high degree of credibility to the technical side of the humaneness and sustainability of the seal hunt.

In summary, I believe a carefully conceived and well-informed parliamentary mission to specific European countries would be constructive in conveying a reasoned Canadian message on the seal hunt and in helping European legislators gain a balanced perspective.

I'd be happy to take any questions.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gerald Keddy]

Thank you very much. That was an excellent presentation.

Mr. Simms, 10 minutes.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. And thank you for giving me the honour to be here today as, I suppose, a last-minute replacement.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gerald Keddy]

Never last-minute.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Obviously we've never been married.

When I went to Europe, I spoke to the European Council, and one of the things I've noticed in the past little while....

This document, which wasn't prepared by you, says the following:

A preliminary draft recommendation...prepared by the secretariat of the Committee on the Environment....is surprisingly balanced, and does not call for an outright ban of the Canadian seal hunt and the importation of all seal products.

This particular draft recommendation is what they're now concerned with.

Now, that's not really what I got from that, because I think we are dangerously close to many of these assemblies of individual nations having an outright ban on seal imports. Perhaps I'm wrong, but I'm seeing a lot of grassroots support for the outright ban of seal hunting, and with no information whatsoever; that we all know.

What scares me is when I see nations like Norway--correct me if I'm wrong--subsidize, at certain levels, discarding seal products in order to get out of the industry. Call it rumour, call it conjecture, call it what you wish, but what I see, from this draft report, is not particularly balanced, or not the way we like to think it is.

Are you familiar with this draft recommendation? I'm assuming you are.

[Norbert Kalisch]

Is that the Council of Europe?

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Yes, it is. It's the council's draft recommendation.