Fisheries Committee on April 23rd, 2013

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

I call this meeting to order.

I'd like to take this opportunity to welcome our guests here today and thank them for taking the time to come and meet with committee members to talk about the northern Arctic study we're embarking upon, and to give us some advice, some insight, and answer some questions that committee members might have.

Mr. Burden, I believe you're going to make a presentation to begin with. I'll ask that you take a moment to introduce your colleagues with you today. I think you've all been here before the committee. I welcome you back to the committee, and thank you very much, once again.

Any time you're ready, Mr. Burden, I'll let you take over.

[David Burden, Acting Regional Director General, Central and Arctic Region, Department of Fisheries and Oceans]

Thank you.

My name is David Burden. I'm the regional director general for the central and Arctic region. I have with me this morning my colleagues: Dave Gillis is the director general of ecosystems science here at headquarters; and Blair Hodgson will answer all the tough questions related to resource management in the Arctic.

Good morning everyone.

I want to thank you for the opportunity to help the committee as part of this discussion on Canada's northern and arctic fisheries.

I will make my presentation in English, but we will be able to answer your questions in both languages, as usual.

As this is the start of your study, we've put together a rather comprehensive deck for you that covers the five elements that you'll notice on slide 2. The first and most important one for anything related to our management in the Arctic is on the governance.

The northern land claim process has gone on for decades and has resulted in areas set aside for the benefit of traditional users.

The James Bay and Northern Quebec Agreement was the first agreement signed back in the 1970s—1975 to be exact. There followed a series of others, as you can see, across the north. The most recent agreement was the Eeyou Marine Region Agreement in 2010.

There are some areas shown that are as yet not covered by finalized agreements. For example, in the Northwest Territories around Great Slave Lake, negotiations are ongoing with the Dehcho on the east side of Great Slave Lake.

The Nunavut Land Claims Agreement covers the largest surface area. It was signed back in 1993. Land claims have greatly influenced the way we decide and deliver our programs and services in the Arctic.

The land claim agreements created fisheries and/or wildlife management boards. In Nunavut, the Nunavut Wildlife Management Board deals with both fisheries and wildlife species and issues. In the Inuvialuit Final Agreement in the western Arctic, it's the Fisheries Joint Management Committee that deals with matters related to the fisheries.

The boards are typically described as the main instruments of fisheries or wildlife management in the settlement area. The co-management regime created by the claim basically insists that the government operate in ways that we don't see traditionally in the south. It makes for an integrated approach with our co-management partners. The way we do business is by consensus. In the past the government would have done this work on its own, unilaterally.

The land claim agreements insist that there is shared decision-making. This ensures, of course, that opinions are heard in a consultative process and that the decisions integrate traditional knowledge as well as our core science background knowledge. Having the beneficiaries part of the decision-making process makes it relevant to the circumstances for them, and it has added the benefit of giving ownership and community support for the decisions.

Turning to slide 5, fisheries play an important role in the lives of many northerners. The largest commercial fisheries in the north are located in the eastern Arctic, in the Davis and Hudson straits in Baffin Bay. In Nunavut, the main species harvested are Greenland halibut, or turbot, northern shrimp, and Arctic char.

The estimated value in 2005 to the Nunavut economy was $12 million to $14 million annually, and around 300 seasonal jobs were created. The potential landed value in 2007 for shrimp and Greenland halibut, for the Nunavut share, was approximately $55 million, and that would be if the entire quota were harvested. At this point in time, they have not been able to catch their entire quota. Commercial sales of Arctic char in Nunavut are estimated to bring around $1.2 million annually to the economy.

If we turn to slide 6 on the NAFO sub areas, Greenland halibut stocks are part of the shared stock between Greenland and Canada. While there's no formal agreement with Greenland for this fishery, Canada has traditionally claimed 50% of the overall total allowable catch.

The NAFO Scientific Council provides us with TAC recommendations on an annual basis. The commercial TAC currently is at 13,510, which is fish by enterprises based in Nunavut, Newfoundland, and the Maritimes.

The 0A TAC is provided exclusively to Nunavut through a special allocation to the Nunavut Wildlife Management Board on behalf of the Nunavut Inuit. The division 0B fishery includes harvesters from Nunavut, Newfoundland, Labrador, northern Quebec, and Nova Scotia. In addition, there's a 900-tonne competitive fixed gear quota, where four Nunavut enterprises have nine of the 22 licence validations.

Respecting Nunavut's special allocations, the Nunavut Wildlife Management Board provides suballocation decisions and recommendations to the minister for his approval. These adjacent fisheries are seen as economic development priorities for the Government of Nunavut and aboriginal groups. Nunavut's share of the adjacent Greenland halibut fisheries has grown over the past decade from 27% to 70% of the available quota. Nunavut interests continue to advocate for an 80% to 90% share of their adjacent resources.

In 2005 a separate management area was established inshore of the Cumberland Sound, with a 500-tonne total allowable harvest, and it is exclusively fished by the Nunavut Inuit.

Turning to slide 7 and looking at shrimp, shrimp fishing in areas 1, 2, and 3 is accessible to the 17 offshore licence-holders. As well, there are special allocations to Nunavut and Nunavik.

In 2011 industry received MSC certification for shrimp fisheries in the north. The SFA 1 TAC has been set at 11,333 tonnes for the coming fishing season in 2013. SFA 2 and SFA 3 are domestic stocks. In December of 2012 the minister approved shrimp management changes for SFA 2 and SFA 3 effective for the 2013-14 season. These new SFAs were put in place for management purposes of the total allowable catch. They are based on two distinct science survey assessment zones, one in the east and one in the west, and are distributed to the new management units as per the fixed sharing arrangement approved by the minister.

The decision-making process and sharing arrangements between Nunavut and Nunavik are still being worked on, and we hope to have that resolved in short while.

Current landed value for shrimp is just under $3,000 per tonne. If Nunavut fished all of its available quota, the landed value would be in the area of $32 million.

Turning to slide 8 and the central part of the north, Arctic char plays an important role in the nutrition and social and cultural aspects of the northern community. It fosters continuation of traditional culture and lifestyle, provision of traditional foods, and local self-sufficiency. The nutritional and cultural value of Arctic char cannot be adequately and effectively replaced by southern foods.

In Cambridge Bay, the Arctic char fishery is the largest in Nunavut. It typically accounts for more than half of the commercial harvest of char.

Moving back to the east, on slide 9, and to Greenland halibut, the ice platform harvests over the winter have varied over the years due to the varying ice conditions that we find from winter to winter. Peak landings were seen this past year, with 304 tonnes landed so far this year. This fishery is starting to wind down as we're getting to the end of April and into May.

The fish plant is paying fishermen a rate of about $1.30 a pound. Efforts are under way to continue to explore the development of a small vessel open water fishery to fully utilize and exploit the 500-tonne total allowable harvest.

Harvest of commercial Arctic char takes place in both winter and summer; however, the char harvested in the summer has a higher economic value. Accessibility due to proximity and weather—and that's proximity to markets and weather issues—to these water varieties, as well as market demand, dictate fishing efforts from year to year. Peak summer landings for char were seen in 2004 and 2005 at about 24 tonnes, but in the summer of 2012, the char landings were reported to be at about 14 tonnes.

The fish plant in Pangnirtung employs between 20 and 45 people, depending on the season. Of course, as you'll know from our previous discussions, the Pangnirtung small craft harbour will be opened in the summer of 2013.

On slide 10, we're looking to the Northwest Territories.

I'm sort of bouncing back and forth here. I apologize for that.

The Northwest Territories commercial fisheries are primarily based on whitefish, lake trout, pickerel, walleye, northern pike, and inconnu. The commercial fishing operations in the Northwest Territories are primarily carried out on inland and freshwater lakes. The largest and best example, of course, is the Great Slave Lake fishery. All fish are sold or marketed by the Freshwater Fish Marketing Corporation on behalf of the local fishers.

I'll give you slide 11 as a reference to the examples of the zones for the commercial fisheries on Great Slave Lake. While we're in the west, we'll talk a little about the fisheries in the Yukon—again, similar kinds of whitefish, with some salmon, the chinook and chum varieties. But the bigger fisheries in the Yukon would be the recreational fisheries, which make up about 85% of the freshwater fish harvest. They have the highest residential participation in Canada, at 20%, and bring in about $23 million per year to the local economy.

On slide 13, looking at subsistence fisheries, we can't underestimate the importance and value of these fisheries to the local communities. They provide a way of continuing the traditional lifestyles, supporting their culture, supplying considerable protein, and contributing to local self-sufficiency. The byproducts for marine mammal harvesting are also of economic importance. When I talk about that, I'm talking about things like walrus tusk and narwhal tusk, which are used for arts and crafts and have a considerable value in both the domestic and international markets.

Looking at science in support of all this, there are a number of elements that we've identified on slides 14 and 15. The department is also engaged in several other types of scientific activities that are linked to this. One interesting study that's under way is the study of the marine ecosystems in the offshore areas of the Canadian Beaufort Sea. This ongoing study is providing many insights into the marine species that live in these waters as well as other elements of the ecosystem, such as the benthic communities, the oceanography, and water column structure. This will provide an important baseline in the pre-development phase in the Beaufort Sea, and it is adding greatly to our knowledge and understanding of how the Arctic may or may not support commercial fisheries in the future in the high western Arctic.

Climate change is also expected to affect northern areas more than other areas. The department has a number of studies that are under way to better understand the possible effects and to consider adaptation to them. The extent of sea ice loss in the Arctic is monitored by many agencies around the world, and Canadian scientists are playing a key role in that. Other studies are monitoring the change in species distribution, phytoplankton growth, invasive species, and the development of ecosystem models to guide adaptation change.

Not mentioned on the slides, but critically important to our work in the north, is the work that's being carried out by our Canadian Hydrographic Service. Clearly, enhanced Arctic charting is a priority. As we see increased shipping and transportation patterns in the Arctic, we're looking at new technologies to allow us to advance our work in that area.

Wrapping up, I'd like to talk quickly about some emerging fisheries. There's a Cumberland Sound 500-tonne quota. This past winter has provided some of the best fishing in recent years. There's a wish, as I mentioned earlier, for others to explore using a summer fishery with gillnets and longlines. This is something that has pros and cons. There are some folks who are a little concerned—or a lot concerned, I guess, is probably a better way of saying it—about possible entrapment and entanglement of marine mammals such as whales. We have to balance and find the best way with our co-management partners to exploit that fishery, if we advance on it, in a sustainable way without impacting marine mammals.

There's also been some work, mostly exploratory, on shellfish populations. Some localized clam, mussel, and scallop populations have been identified, but both the supply and the economics of a venture in that requires further work with our co-management partners. Crab exploratory work in the Hudson Strait, off Nunavut, has failed to find significant quantities of any type of crab that would be available for the commercial market.

There's also been some work on an exploratory kelp fishery in the western Hudson Bay, but that has not developed as yet into a commercial venture.

There are, however, undiscovered inshore turbot and shrimp opportunities, and we're hoping the stock assessment work that's under way will help reveal and exploit those opportunities for northerners.

The second last slide I have is related to opportunities. We talk in our region and in the department about the emerging fisheries in the north. We need more science, we need to continue our work in that area, and we need to work with our co-management partners and the Government of Nunavut specifically to ensure that the economic possibilities of these fisheries are exploited for the use of the local communities.

I'll end with some of the challenges. From the science side, we're talking about an area where the resources are unknown, where the population estimates are dated, and where stock assessment work is difficult and very costly to undertake. That's why we do a lot of this work in cooperation with other partners in other jurisdictions.

Resources are always a challenge in the north. We have financial as well as human resource challenges of doing business in the Arctic. Last but not least, there is the issue of infrastructure. The oceans are the highway of the Arctic, and the infrastructure to support that is critical to exploiting the fisheries for the benefit of northerners.

Mr. Chair, I think that will be a good place for us to stop. I hope I've not taken up too much time. We'll have some interaction on what is really of interest to the committee.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Thank you very much, Mr. Burden. I appreciate your presentation.

We're going to start off with Mr. Kamp this morning.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and my thanks to you gentlemen for appearing before us as we begin this northern and Arctic study.

It's probably just me, but that was a lot of material, and I know I haven't digested it all. We may need to go back and look at the transcript to understand completely all you've provided for us. We are grateful for the overview.

Can you tell me a little more about the co-management models that are used throughout the north? How do they compare with what's used in the south, and what is DFO's role and presence in the north?

[David Burden]

I've not had the pleasure of dealing with the southern management of fisheries. All my experience has been in the central and Arctic regions. We have a cooperative and integrated approach. I sit on a committee—a formal governance body—that we have established under the land claim with the Government of Nunavut, the Nunavut Wildlife Management Board. It is our co-management partner, as well as NTI, which is the commercial and representative organization of the beneficiaries.

We have established our priorities for addressing the fisheries, and we work on those with an integrated approach. During the last few years, our focus has been on establishing an integrated fisheries management plan for narwhal. We are focusing our work on establishing basic need levels across all of the fisheries, and we are looking at the future as those works are starting to come to a conclusion. We're going to be working on establishing Nunavut fisheries regs. This work, done with our co-management partners, will allow for a made-in-Nunavut set of regulations, as opposed to the present regulations, which were established for the Northwest Territories.

So everything is done in a cooperative fashion. We have formal meetings twice a year. We have informal meetings. I have a director of northern operations who is in the Arctic and works with our co-management partners on a daily basis on all of the issues.

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

You've talked mostly about commercial fisheries, although you did refer to subsistence fisheries and I think you made a mention or two of recreational fisheries. Can you give me a bit more clarification of what you mean by a subsistence fishery and how it relates to a recreational fishery? Are they two completely different things, or are they different challenges and different opportunities as well?

[David Burden]

I would say they are two separate things: a traditional fishery versus a recreational fishery. A recreational fishery, to me, is a fishery where folks like us would go up and pay money for a licence, as clearly some of the best fishing in the world is in the north.

You can't really look at the traditional fisheries in the Arctic from a monetary dollar value and gauge their importance. They would pale in comparison to many of the fisheries in the south. But if you look at the food value or the value that it brings into those communities, you would have to multiply it tenfold or a hundredfold. The difference in being able to harvest seals is clearly an issue of importance to this committee and to Canada, and it is fundamentally important to many of these communities. The ability to be able to harvest those marine mammals and to be able to put traditional or comfort foods on the table is the difference between being able to have a family that is self-sufficient or a family that is in dire straits.

The sense of community involvement is unlike what I'm used to in eastern Canada, where you'll have fishing parties go out. These are traditional fisheries done at the community level. They work as a local unit. Obviously, the proceeds of that are shared across the community or across communities. The success of the community is shared even with the elders and those who are old or infirm and are not necessarily able to prosecute that themselves, and they benefit because they look after everybody. So it's very important to look at the traditional fisheries and what it means to the community and what it means to the Inuit from a cultural perspective.

Obviously, the recreational fisheries provide much needed economic input to the communities, but it would be of a secondary nature. If we were into issues of conservation concerns or anything like that, we would first look after the traditional fisheries, and then we'd look at the commercial recreational fisheries as a secondary item.

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

Good. That's helpful.

It's my understanding that for a few years now the U.S. have been pushing for a moratorium on fisheries in the Arctic. I'm wondering what the department's view of that is and whether it might be in Canada's future as well.

[David Burden]

I was asked that same question a couple of weeks ago at the foreign affairs committee.

We don't currently have commercial fisheries in the western Arctic, so the American position on a moratorium is to my mind a little bit moot. We do have a process. The minister has articulated the position, and we will work with our co-management partners and do the appropriate research. As Dave could say, we're a long way away from the Canadian waters, of being in a position to be able to have the data we need to look at some kind of a commercial fishery in the high western Arctic.

I think the surveys we've done to this point have shown that there's a number of fish there, but they're of a smaller size and they're spread out, and they wouldn't really be marketable from a commercial perspective, at least based on the studies we have to date.

Dave, do you have anything to add to that?

[David Gillis, Director General, Ecosystems and Oceans Science Sector, Department of Fisheries and Oceans]

No. I think that's a good summary.

We do have studies under way in the western Arctic area, and they are beginning to reveal to us what those population species' assemblages and abundances are. We have certainly not, as of yet, found what you'd see as a ready commercial resource.

As David said, we do have policies that guide us around these questions in Canada on the emerging fisheries policy, and it does require us to have a certain level of information about a resource so that we can make some informed decisions before we proceed. I don't see anything on the immediate horizon.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Thank you, Mr. Kamp.

Mr. Chisholm, it's your turn.

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

Thank you very much for being here, gentlemen.

Mr. Burden, that was a very interesting presentation. We will need to go back through the transcript, and there were some points I'd like to dig down deeper on.

One of the issues is around these management committees you referred to. Where do they exist? Could you supply us with overall...? They all have plans for different fisheries, but they all have an overall plan. Are there too many to provide us with copies of those plans, or could you provide us with examples of them? How many exist, and where are they?

It would be interesting to get a look at their management plans.

[David Burden]

I'm at a loss to be able to give you an exact number. Obviously we have management plans for all the fisheries, and many of them have evolved over time.

I'm struggling because sheer numbers would be the issue. Every time we prosecute a fishery, a management plan has to be created, and that would be the basis of that fishery. So there would be one for every fishery we have, whether it be harvesting marine mammals or whether it be for char, Greenland halibut, or shrimp.

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

Are there committees in each territory? Are they in each region of each territory?

[David Burden]

Okay. I was confused by where you were coming from.

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

I do that sometimes with my questions.

[David Burden]

Perhaps it's my jet lag.

I think each of the fisheries is assessed with our co-management bodies, and we work on a co-management plan. So the plan, depending on the fishery—if it's in the western Arctic, in the areas that would come under the Fisheries Joint Management Committee, we would work with them; they would use our science, and we would use their traditional knowledge. We would work with the local hunter-trapper organizations. We would develop a sustainable plan. It would be discussed with the various communities, and we'd get their input. We'd determine what the harvest level would be, and then that would be prosecuted and we'd go forward.

We do the same thing in Cumberland Sound with the inshore fisheries.

When we get to the NAFO kind of fishery, there's a different process. Blair is probably more comfortable with that than I am and could speak to the vagaries of how those arrangements are put in place. As I said in my remarks, theirs are shared with multiple regions, so it's more than just the region I have accountability for.

Blair.

[Blair Hodgson, Acting Director General, Resource Management, Ecosystems and Fisheries Management Sector, Department of Fisheries and Oceans]

To perhaps clarify something a little, there's a bit of a difference between a board and the committee. Wildlife management boards, or entities of that type, are established by all the land claims agreements. Those boards provide advice to the minister, who ultimately makes decisions.

Nunavut is special because we've established a cooperation committee with them, but we have mechanisms that are similar with all the boards, for which there are land claims that have established such an organization. Something like northern shrimp or Greenland halibut does become more complex, because you might involve more than one land claim area—for example, Nunavut and Nunavik for shrimp.

We work with both of those partners in establishing a management plan for the area, and special allocations and commercial allocations are fairly finely subdivided. Nunavik and Nunavut do have overlapping claims, and we're waiting for a resolution between those two land claim bodies on the sharing of a resource between the two of them. The minister has determined the overall amount, and he's awaiting advice from the two boards—which will come separately—on the shares that should be allocated between them.

David also mentioned 0A and 0B turbot—you'll have to forgive me for using the numbers and letters, but it's how we manage things. That's Davis Strait and those are stocks that are shared between Canada and Greenland, both turbot and shrimp. For them, Canada and Greenland jointly ask for advice from the NAFO Scientific Council. Although it's not a high seas fishery, it's shared between the two countries. NAFO does provide the service to us as contracting parties. They provide us with scientific advice, and then we unilaterally and separately determine our catch limits.

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

Thank you for that additional information. I asked the question because, as David said in his presentation, the way the fishery is managed and prosecuted in the north is different from how it is done in the south.

I think that's one of the important questions we're going to be exploring as a committee, so I would be looking for examples of where that difference lies, in the focus on the traditional fishery, subsistence fishery, and so on. That's where I'm going, and that's what I'll be looking for as we go forward.

On the question of the degree of engagement of DFO in these fisheries, once the management plan is developed and it's prosecuted, how involved is DFO? What kinds of resources does DFO have on the ground in these areas?

[David Burden]

We have the full complement of the resources required to prosecute, manage, and enforce fisheries. We have a C and P complement across the Arctic that looks after the enforcement side of the house and the management. As well, we have resource management folks on the ground in the western Arctic, stationed out of Yellowknife and Inuvik. We have staff in Iqaluit. We also have science folks in the Arctic—and that's a bit of a coup for us, to have science staff resident in the high Arctic on a regular basis.

One concern expressed to us by our co-management partners is that the government presence has been very nomadic. We come in, do the work, and then we take the stuff and go south. We've been fortunate to have some rock-solid scientist folks agreeing to work in the Arctic for sustained periods of time, which helps build a rapport and a sense of being in a community. It opens up a lot of doors and allows us to marry the core science information with the traditional knowledge.

We have the capacity. Obviously, we'd like to have more, as anybody would say, but we are managing the full set of the fisheries, and in doing that, we're working with the co-management partners. The territorial governments have conservation officers who work very much in partnership with ours.

In fact, just this past February, we had some integrated training for our enforcement teams. It went through use of force, how to gather evidence, the appropriate way to measure narwhal tusks, and all of these things. When we do those joint training operations, it makes us all stronger, and it makes a presence, so we can expand by force. It's the same thing with the way we do our scientific research.

We have numerous examples where Canada partners with the United States or with other international partners to procure ship time and share the resources. Scientists are looking for a platform, and we can do a multitude of research activities, particularly during the daylight part of the year, and run 24-hour operations. The more scientists we can get on, the more we can reduce the costs and expand the scope of the work we're able to do.

There's a lot of leveraging of opportunities. The unique aspect of the fisheries in the Arctic has allowed us to leverage those opportunities that industry, co-management partners, and governments are investing into the research and the science around the fisheries. That's helping us expand our capacity manyfold.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Thank you, Mr. Chisholm.

Before we continue, colleagues, I want to welcome to our committee today Senator Charlie Watt, the senator from Nunavik and northern Quebec region.

I want to thank you, Senator, and welcome you this morning to our committee meeting. The senator has a particular interest in the subject matter we're studying here today

Next we're going to Mr. Allen.

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

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

And thank you, gentlemen, for being here today.

You talked a little bit about one of the seasons. I'd like to just get a sense of the different seasons for the species across the north. You said one of them was wrapping up. Can you briefly and quickly lay out the different seasons, for example, for halibut, shrimp, and char, so the committee can get a sense as to the timing?

[David Burden]

I'll break that down into the winter fisheries and the summer fisheries.

In Cumberland Sound there is a Greenland halibut or inshore turbot fishery that's just wrapping up. That's the one I was mentioning. There's probably about another month or so of that. That's on the ice using longline kind of grounded technology. There's going to be a lot of the fisheries in the western Arctic for the whitefish as soon as the ice starts coming out of Great Slave Lake. Probably in the early part of June those fisheries will start off and we'll start seeing the plant open up in Hay River.

The fisheries in the east, through the strait, would start probably in late May and continue on. We're seeing fishers staying there until almost December. So there's probably about three, maybe four, months of the year that there's not commercial activity up in there.

Does that pretty much cover it?

[Blair Hodgson]

Yes, I think so.

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

On the recreational side, would the time period be generally May till the fall?