Fisheries Committee on May 28th, 2013

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

I'll call this meeting to order.

Gentlemen, I want to thank you for taking the time to meet with us today. We really appreciate your being able to accommodate this committee and we certainly look forward to the discussion that we're about to have.

As you've probably been made aware by our clerk, we're in the midst of a study, and we certainly would like to bend your ear on the work that you've done previously. We certainly look forward to an opportunity to ask questions by all committee members, and we look forward to your presentation as well.

Mr. Lindsey, I believe you're going to lead the presentation.

[Dan Lindsey, Director, Fish and Wildlife Branch, Government of Yukon]

Sure. Thanks for the invitation. If it's okay, we'll begin briefly with the presentation.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Certainly.

[Dan Lindsey]

Nathan Millar will present, more specifically, the actual status of the fisheries overview.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Thank you very much.

I should warn you beforehand that if I interrupt sometimes, I apologize if I offend you, but we are constrained by certain time limits for members' questions and answers. It's in the interest of fairness and trying to ensure that all members have the opportunity to ask questions.

Other than that, I'll turn it over to you to make your presentation and then we'll move into questions after that.

[Dan Lindsey]

Okay.

The focus was on the status of the Yukon fishery and to provide a bit of context and background to this. Up until 1989, Yukon had only managed wildlife, and through some agreements and negotiations we ended up with the Canada-Yukon agreement, signed in 1989, which essentially allowed Yukon to manage freshwater fish, administrative authority to manage freshwater fish, not anadromous fish. The agreement allowed for other aspects: habitat, fish inspections, and aquaculture. We added, I believe, aquaculture to that a year or two later. So we've been operating under that system since essentially 1989. There were some funds that were transferred and some adjustments to our base transfers, but that essentially created Yukon's involvement in freshwater fish management.

Around the same time, we were beginning the comprehensive land claim negotiations, and essentially in the early 1990s we end up with four final agreements and what was called the umbrella final agreement. Just so everybody is aware, this really changed the landscape of resource management, and particularly fish and wildlife management, in the Yukon, significantly. It wasn't an agreement solely for aboriginal people. It created a new management regime over all Yukon, to which all Yukoners and those visiting have adapted.

Just a brief view of what the agreements do. They have created a number of bodies, an overall fish and wildlife management board, a salmon subcommittee, and renewable resource councils for each first nation area. We have 11 completed modern treaties, three that don't have treaties, and then two transboundary. Overall, we're in pretty reasonable shape as far as modern treaties go. Essentially for close to 20 years we've been managing the freshwater fish and dealing with those bodies, the local communities, and the input that those public structures have.

Why undertake a status of fisheries review? After a 20-year period, you often have to look back to see where you need to go in the future, what's working, what is not working, what the users are doing, any trends that you see, and maybe any gaps that you might encounter. Essentially, what is the litmus test? What are we doing? Are we achieving the provisions that we agreed to in the final agreements, and are our general conservation principles respected under the Fisheries Act and in resource management?

We do have now a dedicated fisheries section. It's small but very efficient. Nathan has been managing that over the last while. One of the overall concerns is how are we doing with our fishery. How are we, collectively, managing? It's a question that we did receive from a number of the land claim bodies and first nations directly. We only really have one Yukon, so it's not like we can move along. If we're not managing correctly, it's going to take a long time to recover, especially in the north, where growth rates for fish can be decades.

That's kind of the overview of why we entered into the status of fisheries review and where we came from, in a nutshell. If there are any questions, I can answer those or wait until later. Otherwise I'll turn it over to Nathan to get into the specifics.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Thank you.

Go ahead, Mr. Millar.

[Nathan Millar, Senior Fisheries Biologist, Acting Manager of Habitat Programs, Government of Yukon]

Thank you.

As Dan said, the impetus for the report was that we'd been doing fisheries management in Yukon for 20 years and it was time to take a close look at what we'd been doing and where we wanted to go. It was an effort to bring together all of this historic and contemporary data into one place and lay out the context in which we manage fisheries, some of the specific conditions of fisheries in the north, and an assessment of how we were doing.

The first time we brought data together into one place, we looked at it across the territory, and within specific bodies of water or on a species-by-species basis. We asked ourselves how these populations were doing. We asked whether we were using the management tools we wanted to use and that were appropriate to get the information we need to make good decisions. We went into a lot of detail about individual species and the kind of information we used to collect them over that 20-year period in particular, and then looked forward to whether we should be doing things differently in the future. At the end of this report, we had useful lessons in terms of the things we wanted to be focusing on for the next 20 years of fisheries management, and new and arising concerns.

To jump to some of the lessons learned here, overall the fish stocks are primarily very healthy in the Yukon. There are some notable exceptions, but they're exceptions that we know about and spend more time managing. We found that our ability to monitor these populations had some constraints, and the report really prompted us to examine new ways, novel ways, more cost-efficient ways, and also more robust ways, of monitoring fisheries so we could make some good science-based decisions as to how we manage these stocks.

Communication with our partners, as Dan laid out very well in the introduction, and the context in which we do fisheries management in the Yukon, is unique. It has some shared aspects with other northern jurisdictions, but in the context of the final agreements, the way we do our work with our first nation partners and regional resource councils is a very important component of that. Strengthening those relationships was something we found to be important.

There were a few trends and threats on the horizon that we were aware of and that we're starting to work toward addressing. One of those is aquatic invasive species. We're still in quite a healthy state in regard to aquatic invasive species, but we know it's a threat. It's one we're conscious of. We're beginning to develop some programs around that because we can see the detrimental effects of these introductions elsewhere.

Those are just a few of the take-home messages from this work that we've done.

I'll leave it there, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Thank you very much, gentlemen.

We're going to move into questions at this point.

We'll start off with Mr. Sopuck.

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Marquette, MB]

Great. Thanks. I appreciated your comments.

In terms of the fish stocks, you made the point that the fishery is, by and large, fairly healthy, with some exceptions.

What Yukon fish stocks are not in good shape?

[Nathan Millar]

Thanks for the question.

It would be more the populations for particular species. The three main fisheries that are most heavily utilized are Arctic grayling, northern pike, and lake trout. Within each of those three species, there are certain populations that we found were probably overexploited to some degree. The fisheries in the Yukon aren't distributed evenly across the landscape, so they tend to be focused around the communities, particularly around Whitehorse. They tend to be small lakes with campgrounds, for instance, or close to the towns. That would be for the lake trout populations.

For some of the stream dwellers like Arctic grayling, people tend to know where some of the good spawning runs are, so those easily accessible runs have been depleted over a number of years. Primarily we'd say that lake trout and Arctic grayling have declined, and to some degree we're finding that burbot populations have probably declined, but our information on them is somewhat less. We're still looking into that.

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Marquette, MB]

Okay, great.

What is the rough dollar value of each of the recreational fishery, the commercial fishery, and the domestic fishery in Yukon?

[Nathan Millar]

The data I have from the recreational fishery comes from the five-year national recreational fisheries survey that's done across the country and led by DFO. From that survey we estimate through direct and indirect expenditures about $23 million for the recreational fishery across the territory.

These days the commercial fishery is quite small. The way it's regulated it has the potential to be somewhat larger. We don't have direct estimates of the value, but I can tell you there are probably around five to ten part-time commercial fishermen. They would be out a month or two per year, so it's a relatively small dollar value.

With regard to the domestic fishery, in the Yukon, just to give the context, the domestic fishery is for those individuals who lead a traditional sort of on-the-land lifestyle, in which they spend extensive periods of time away from cities or access to grocery stores. There tend to be about 10 to 20 of those licences issued per year, and so they would be harvesting food to feed themselves.

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Marquette, MB]

You mentioned aquatic invasive species as a concern. Which aquatic invasive species are you mainly concerned about?

[Nathan Millar]

We did a threat assessment, which is a separate document I would be happy to share if the committee were interested, that lays out as far as we can gather based on some of the biological principles or the biological characteristics of the species whether they are likely to survive if they are introduced to Yukon waters, because that's a question we have considering the climate up here. We also asked by what means they would be introduced into the Yukon, and what kind of damage they would cause should they be introduced.

We narrowed that down to a smaller list of species. They range from fish species to some parasites to algae. I don't have that list in front of me right now, but we're dealing with a couple of species right now like didymo, which is a multifilamentous algae that we do have in the Yukon. We're not sure of the extent of its invasiveness, but it's something we're beginning to monitor right now.

To answer your question more directly, we have done that work, but it's based on our best assessment of what could come, whether it would stay if it came, and if it stayed what kind of damage it would do. Those are the questions we're asking.

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Marquette, MB]

Given that our committee is developing the idea of a northern fishery study, what gaps could our committee fill if we were to carry this idea further? What would you like to see us do if our study proceeds?

[Dan Lindsey]

One thing that comes to mind if you're focusing specifically on the previous topic on aquatic invasives—and there's of course a committee we participate with Canada in—is that essentially with movement of invasives whether they are on a boat or whatever, as soon as they're in Canada there's no monitoring of them. So anything that comes along and moves interprovincially or inter-territorially is really a very difficult piece to monitor. I know the question of how you prevent the movement of invasives within Canada has often been raised.

It's a tough one for everybody to try to grapple with. Really either we need legislation, which each jurisdiction would prepare, or there could be more of a global piece developed. That's one area on the invasive side. I'll leave the other one that's more on the population management piece to Nathan.

[Nathan Millar]

Yes, I agree with Dan. I think more knowledge of invasives, their likelihood of invading northern environments, and the kinds of impact they would have, would be something that would be very useful to us.

Climate change is something that's always in the front of our minds because the north is changing at a much more rapid pace than more southerly jurisdictions, so the impacts of changing climate, be it temperature or precipitation, how that would impact fishery resources. I know there has been some good work done to date, but that's always something on our minds.

I also think that there are some gaps in basic science and understanding of fish populations. The north tends to be a place where there's lots of interest, but the depth of our knowledge is most likely less than in more southerly and more studied places. Even understanding the causes of productivity and exploitation pressure on fish stocks is something that work has been done on for many decades, but the depth of that work and the understanding is less than in more southerly jurisdictions.

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Marquette, MB]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Chisholm.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Gentlemen, it's a pleasure to have you here with us today. My name is Robert Chisholm. I'm a member of Parliament from Nova Scotia.

This committee is excited about exploring the fisheries in the north and the impact of pressures on the fishery in the north. We're very interested in the report that was done on the Yukon fishery in 2010. I'm pleased to have the opportunity to pursue some of the issues that you raise.

Maybe to begin, I thought your report was quite instructive. It talks about moving to ecosystem-based and watershed-based management in order to deal with your fishery. Would you explain that to some degree and also talk to me a little bit about the relationship with DFO in that regard?

[Nathan Millar]

Sure. Thanks for the question.

The idea behind what we conceive of as ecosystem and watershed-based management is that there are a lot of commonalities and similarities among fish species within particular watersheds. For those reasons, managing them as a unit collectively or considering them collectively has some sound biological and scientific basis.

One example that springs to mind is in the Southern Lakes area of Yukon, close to Whitehorse. We have a chain of very large lakes that are connected by short and somewhat longer rivers. What we find is that there is a lot of movement of fish in amongst these lakes. What we have been doing primarily is managing them on a lake-by-lake basis. What we realize is that because of the interconnectedness of these lakes and of the populations that live in them, we need to consider them as a whole. So that's what we're considering by this ecosystem and watershed-based management—you're looking at the interconnectedness of the species and the populations that you're managing.

I was wondering if you could clarify the second part of your question in terms of our relationship with DFO. Would you like to know just in general the sort of division of labour, if you will, between the governments, or did you have a more specific question?

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

First of all, let me say that I appreciate what you're saying about the interconnectedness of the ecosystems as it relates to fish populations and the importance of habitat in protecting those populations.

I'm trying to get a sense of, in the Yukon, what role does DFO play in assisting or working with you and your partners in order to perform that management, whether it be science, whether it be habitat protection. What role?

[Nathan Millar]

In 1989, the Yukon government was delegated management authorities from Canada, but that delegation did not include management of habitat. Those responsibilities still lie with Fisheries and Oceans Canada. They're responsible for managing all fish habitat for salmonids and also for freshwater fish. As a result, we work quite closely together, given that we're the managers of freshwater fish, but they are responsible for the management of their habitat.

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

That's interesting. I was curious about that agreement from 1989, and this gets right to the heart of it for me. So DFO is still responsible for management of habitat.