Evidence of meeting #28 for Fisheries and Oceans in the 40th Parliament, 3rd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was aquaculture.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Fin Donnelly NDP New Westminster—Coquitlam, BC
Do you know why the province hadn't issued any new licences and how the department will handle looking at those applications in the future?
Director General, Aquaculture Management, Department of Fisheries and Oceans
With respect to the first part of that question, the province had a new site application process that was very extensive. They spent a lot of time ploughing through the new site applications. Typically, they're looking at between four and seven years for approving a new site, and several of the new site applications were well down that track.
When the court decision came through, the province decided—actually, I don't know exactly when they decided, but it was about four or five months after the decision came through that they decided they would stop that process, on the logic that as part of the transition they didn't need new variables. They had enough to handle collectively, as it was, thank you very much, so they decided not to put more into the hopper.
With respect to the second part of your question, on how the federal government will handle new site applications in the future, again, in the manner I responded earlier, we're running pretty hard to keep up with what we have right now. We don't have our new site application guidelines and processes, and so on, all set up. We're working to get to December 18 in a manner that we'll have the licences and so on issued by then. So I couldn't say to you, “Oh, just a minute, I'll flip to the manual and here's how this will unfold.” However, we will have a much more streamlined system than in place today. There will be a single federal aquaculture licence covering all aspects of aquaculture in the province. We do know that we will use the same decision-making criteria as the province will with respect to assessing some of its lease applications. There won't be 100% overlap, because some won't apply, but we are going to have synchronized decision-making processes, so that applicants will enter one window and will have one application form, with one going to the province and the other to us, but it'll be the same set of information. We're also working very hard with the province to make sure that the decision-making processes we establish are also synchronized, so that you won't get the feds saying yes one day and eight months later the province comes out and says no, or vice versa.
So we're trying to make the decision-making system much more efficient and much better harmonized as we go forward. The details are still to follow, in terms of exactly how that will work, but we don't expect to receive new site applications on December 19.
NDP
Fin Donnelly NDP New Westminster—Coquitlam, BC
Thank you.
Will the regulations deal at all with closed containment? It's obviously an issue I've been working on quite a bit, so I'm just curious about it.
Director General, Aquaculture Management, Department of Fisheries and Oceans
Yes, I've heard that.
Director General, Aquaculture Management, Department of Fisheries and Oceans
Sorry, I shouldn't have said that.
The regulations don't deal with closed containment directly, in the sense that you won't find the words “closed containment” in there. However, if an operation were to set up, say, tomorrow in a closed containment proposal, they'd first have to get a licence to do that. But pretend just for the minute that the new site application process were in place and people applied for a licence to conduct aquaculture in a closed containment facility. From the way we've set up the regulations, we're pretty confident that we've given ourselves the tools in section 4, with the conditions of licence, to attach whatever conditions we would need to put in place to deal with closed containment.
So whilst you won't see the words “closed containment” in there, there are several provisions in the licence conditions that are put in place with that possibility, to some considerable degree, in mind. What we want to avoid is getting ourselves into a position where, for example, we had a closed containment operation ready to go in a year, or something like that, and found ourselves saying, “Crap, now we'll have to go back and produce some regulatory amendment.” We're cautiously optimistic that we won't have to do that.
Anyway, they're designed with closed containment in mind, but not necessarily to force anyone to it.
Conservative
John Weston Conservative West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC
Thank you, monsieur le président.
And thanks for joining us again, Trevor.
I gather from your comments that it's closed containment if necessary, but not necessarily closed containment.
Director General, Aquaculture Management, Department of Fisheries and Oceans
It's a better turn of phrase than I used.
Shall I interpret that as a question about closed containment?
Conservative
John Weston Conservative West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC
Well, in other words, the new terms in your regulations are open to closed containment, but no one is dictating it—
Director General, Aquaculture Management, Department of Fisheries and Oceans
Right.
Conservative
John Weston Conservative West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC
—and should the market or other forces invite closed containment, then it's there for us to explore. If it is to become a leading, innovative thing, as I'm sure Fin would like it to be, then the new regulations are totally open to that.
Director General, Aquaculture Management, Department of Fisheries and Oceans
I think they are very much so, and they are very much, as I mentioned, designed with the ability to regulate it in the future. If it comes to pass, then I think we're in a good position to regulate that kind of activity, but not to require it.
Conservative
John Weston Conservative West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC
Okay, and thank you.
Getting back to your candid comments about the public response to DFO's assuming this jurisdiction, were there any organizations that thought the new DFO management would clearly be an improvement?
Director General, Aquaculture Management, Department of Fisheries and Oceans
With apologies to skeptics, the answer is very much yes. I think that for the most part, many people in the industry very much took the view that DFO moving into this management role would be a positive thing for the industry. I think that many of the environmental organizations we've dealt with certainly felt, and I think still feel, very much the same way.
I have to say that part of that is because of dissatisfaction with the provincial government. There is, to be honest, a bit of a view that anything would be better than that, which I think is quite unfair. Nonetheless, that's the sentiment that was expressed to us. Also, I think there is an acknowledgement that the Department of Fisheries and Oceans has significant capacity with respect to resource management, science, and a variety of other things and that we will be an organization well placed to manage the aquaculture industry going forward.
With the exception of a number of people, typically in the general public sessions, who just felt that DFO should be disbanded—I guess that is the best way to put it, in the most charitable way—I think that by and large, the level of receptivity to the new federal role was fairly high, with plenty of caveats as to how we should do what we are about to do. I didn't get a whole lot of “a pox on all your houses, it shouldn't be you” kind of commentary.
Conservative
John Weston Conservative West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC
Do you have any suggestions as to what we as MPs should be saying about this or how we can be easing the transition, making it better for sustainability, and making it better for the populace? As you may know, we may all be going out to B.C., and I think we all share a sense that we'd love this to succeed.
Director General, Aquaculture Management, Department of Fisheries and Oceans
I'm aware that you're likely to go out there in a few weeks and will get around to some farms, which I think is a great thing.
I'd be a bit reluctant to advise you as to how you would deal with your constituents and your clients and so on. But I think the recurring theme, generally speaking, and certainly the advice we consistently provide, is to try everything possible to move to a discussion based on the facts. I know it is difficult. The facts are ephemeral sometimes and are somewhat elusive. This is a highly emotionally charged discussion, and occasionally that's very unhelpful. I think to the extent that people can be driven towards arguments, debates, and discussions around the science base and the fact base, it ends up putting us in a better position collectively.
Conservative
John Weston Conservative West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC
Switching a little bit to some of the practicalities that dovetail with how everybody works together to do what you're talking about, do you have any thoughts on how often site inspections would take place? What would be involved in site inspections, and how might that differ from the current regime?
Director General, Aquaculture Management, Department of Fisheries and Oceans
Again, part of what I've described as the very detailed operational protocols is in development as we speak. I don't want to sound as if I'm making excuses for ourselves. I simply want to give you a sense of the reality. Part of our problem is that we don't yet have enough people in place to do what those people need to do, if you get what I mean. Our initial efforts are focused very much on putting in place the regulation itself, the licensing regime, and the conditions associated with it. Simply working through the actual recruiting process and booking office space and so on is a huge slug of work.
One of the questions I failed to answer appropriately, when you were asking earlier on, Mr. Cuzner, was how this compares to other things we do. This is a big hire for DFO. We don't hire 55 new people on a regular basis. Simply working through all of that has been quite a bit of effort.
We have not gotten ourselves down to the point where we've designed the operational protocols that would allow me to give you a really precise answer. We expect site visit frequency to go up. We're not expecting it; it will go up, and it will be of two kinds. One will be what one might refer to as the extension or liaison function. We send a biologist or a technician or whatever out to a farm to work with the farmers, have a look at their operations, do fish health inspections, and talk to them on a variety of things associated with just managing the enterprise.
The second would be the boys in green, who will show up as part of a regular C and P inspection protocol. They will come onto a site, they will inspect records and documents, and they will dive into the facilities, or below the facilities, rather. They will not make appointments to come and visit; they will just arrive, as any inspection function would. And potentially, down the line, there will be an investigation, if need be.
We don't know yet how often every single site would be visited by a C and P officer. It will be as frequently as we can get them onto the water, and it will be quite regular. Will it be four or five times a year or two or three? We're not quite sure yet, but it will be significantly more often than what happens today.
Conservative
John Weston Conservative West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC
Who are the boys in green?
Director General, Aquaculture Management, Department of Fisheries and Oceans
Sorry, it's the conservation and protection unit folks from DFO who wear green.
Conservative
John Weston Conservative West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC
Are they the armed ones?
Director General, Aquaculture Management, Department of Fisheries and Oceans
They are, yes.
Conservative
John Weston Conservative West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC
So they strike fear in the hearts of many.
Director General, Aquaculture Management, Department of Fisheries and Oceans
Some of them do. You probably haven't met very many of them.
