Fisheries Committee on Feb. 24th, 2015

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

Thanks, Mr. Chair.

In terms of recreational fisheries there are a lot of questions I could ask. I could ask questions about salmon. For example, why our salmon are leaving our waters, going out to sea, and not coming back from the sea. That's one of the questions, for example, that's been around for a dog's age. It just hasn't been answered. And trout jurisdiction. It goes on and on.

But I'm going to go back to recreational cod fisheries. One of the questions I asked you, Mr. Stringer, was about the 32 days in Newfoundland and Labrador. How does that compare to the Maritimes?

I know Mr. MacAulay asked you a question about P.E.I. Maybe for the benefit of the committee you can provide us with the times for all the recreational fisheries for all of the Atlantic provinces.

You don't have that number 32 comparison today?

[Kevin Stringer]

There's far more time than any other fishery, but I'll have the specifics, and we would be happy to provide that.

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

I would appreciate that.

My quick question is this, because I want to turn it over to François. The two points you mentioned, Mr. Stringer, were codfish are still delicate in waters off Newfoundland and Labrador compared to the 1980s. You also mentioned how Newfoundlanders and Labradorians love to fish, and you're dead on the money about that.

But this restriction, restricting the fishery to two different times, 32 days, has put lives in jeopardy. Some would argue at home that it has actually cost lives in certain incredibly unfortunate circumstances.

Is there any movement in the department to open that up again in comparison to, say, the Maritimes?

[Kevin Stringer]

I think a member made the point that last year when we saw the weather challenges that we had...it was late September, right? There was an understanding that people were possibly going to be out and fishing in very difficult conditions and we didn't want to have an incentive for people to do it. I think you will find that's traditionally been an approach where we will ensure that, as much as possible, we'll adjust our rules on a case-by-case basis to address safety.

You'll have also seen that when we announce the fishery is going to open on this date, sometimes it doesn't open on that date because the weather's bad. We know that when we shoot the gun off that the fishery is about to start, everybody goes out regardless, so we will take those things into account. Safety is a huge issue when you have that many people out on the water. To be candid, it's one thing in inland areas where it's an issue, but it's different being out on a lake and on a river compared to being out at sea. Even if it's in Conception Bay, it's still out at sea. So we do take that seriously. We watch it carefully. We made the decision that was made last year and it's something we need to pay attention to.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Mr. Leef.

[Ryan Leef, Conservative, Yukon, YT]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. It's a quick round.

I know we got this on the record in a previous committee and we did touch a little on it with some of the recreational fisheries conservation partnerships program stats. I'm wondering if perhaps you could table as much information for the record as you have on the results of that, from the beginning to the present day.

[Kevin Stringer]

I'll be happy to do that. What I can do is walk through a bit more of what Melinda was talking about, and the results that I think we spoke to previously I'll speak to again. They're the results that I think we have full results for, because we've done all the tabulations, etc. That was the first year of the program 2013-14.

Under the recreational fisheries partnerships program, $3.1 million was spent. We had 74 different organizations, undertook 94 habitat restoration projects. In addition, with that $3.1 million we leveraged an additional $7.0 million that was brought to those same projects from partners. That's the 1:1.25 leverage ratio.

There were 380 partners involved in those 94 projects. There were 1,700 volunteers who donated their time in those projects and our estimation from their reports is that 2.4 million square metres and 2,000 linear kilometres of recreational fisheries habitat were restored, including restoring access.

Now, Melinda, I don't know if we have from 2014-15 or other projects....

But we will certainly provide you with anything we've got more recent than that.

[Ryan Leef, Conservative, Yukon, YT]

Super.

Thank you very much.

The one thing I didn't note in the initial presentation is this. Is there any role and are there comments on the value of DFO's participation in the hunting and angling advisory panel?

[Kevin Stringer]

I spoke a little about the important relationships that we've got with recreational and angling groups, and I mentioned a few of them. The hunting and angling panel's actually been one more important opportunity for us to connect with some of those groups. They are, for the most part, groups we've had ongoing relationships with.

It's been a very useful venue for us, certainly, for ministers, but also for senior staff and departmental officials to work with those groups. We've worked with them on a number of issues. We've had presentations and discussions with them on aquatic invasive species, on the recreational fisheries partnerships program, on our fisheries protection policy, and on our offsetting policy. There are a number of opportunities that we've had to work with the hunting and angling advisory panel.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Thank you very much, Mr. Leef.

Monsieur Lapointe.

[François Lapointe, NDP, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

Le Journal de Montréal published an article just last week that states the following:

There are salmon populations in 109 rivers in Quebec. According to the most recent report on the Atlantic salmon run in Quebec rivers, if nothing is done in the short term, this species will be in grave danger. For the Atlantic Salmon Federation, data on the wild Atlantic salmon run in Quebec rivers in 2014 present a situation that is in no way encouraging.

For a very large number of Quebec rivers, we are talking about a conservation threshold between 30% and 50% lower than what it should be. The article goes on to say that supporters of salmon consider that Fisheries and Oceans Canada should very quickly form an advisory council so that measures can be taken to save Atlantic salmon in Quebec.

I would like to hear your reaction to this situation, which I think is fairly worrisome.

[Kevin Stringer]

We are greatly concerned about the situation of salmon in Quebec and in the Atlantic provinces.

The minister has established the advisory committee. She has announced it, in any case. We are seeing reductions, particularly in the southern end of the range. I should point out again that it's the Province of Quebec that establishes the rules in Quebec. We establish the management regime elsewhere in Atlantic Canada, but we work closely with Quebec, and Quebec representatives will be connected to the committee to make sure that we have a “pan” approach with respect to those things.

They're being asked to look at issues around predation, mortality at sea, habitat situations, habitat assessment, at whether we have the right management rules in place.... It's a complex set of issues that we need to look at. There are hundreds of individual runs on different rivers from Labrador to Newfoundland to Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, P.E.I., and Quebec. They all have unique circumstances. We have counting fences and we have what we call index rivers. We're able to see trends from year to year on many of them. We're seeing some signs that really concern us as well; hence the establishment of this committee.

What the minister has asked this group to do is to look at those issues, at what the historical trend has been, what the science tells us and does not tell us, what questions we still have to ask, what the issues are around predation, around seals, around striped bass—those types of things—and then provide advice to the minister on further research but also on management measures. Should we move to catch and release everywhere for a period of time? Should we be closing some rivers? What management measures should we be taking?

The department is taking it seriously. Last year we decreased the retention numbers; in other words, you can't catch and keep fish in many areas in which we used to have retention. We closed a couple of rivers that were previously opened. Part of it is what we need to do from a management perspective and part of it is what we need to do to make sure that this is healthy long term and that we have a healthy salmon fishery for the next generations. They are looking at both of those things, and the department is intimately involved.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Thank you very much.

Ms. Davidson.

[Patricia Davidson, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

Thanks very much, Mr. Chair.

And thanks once again for being here with us.

I just have one question, and it is regarding the recreational fisheries conservation partnerships program as well. Could you explain in a little greater detail the eligibility requirements of this and whether they have been changed at all since it was introduced?

[Kevin Stringer]

I'm going to ask Melinda to speak to that. She's running the program.

[Melinda Lontoc-Roy]

In terms of eligible recipients, the program is limited to recreational fishing and angling groups as well as conservation organizations. In terms of eligible activities, the project must actively restore recreational fisheries habitat; that's open to both physical habitat restoration as well as chemical manipulations that will result in benefits to the habitat.

The third criterion is that there's a stacking limit of 75% and a federal cash limit of 50% meaning that we contribute to a broader project, and a maximum of half of the value of that project can come from the federal government and a maximum of 75% of the project value can come from federal, provincial, and municipal governments together.

So the three eligibility criteria are the eligible recipients that I listed, the eligible activities—the physical habitat restoration or chemical manipulation—as well as the funding requirements.

[Patricia Davidson, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

Has that remained constant since the onset?

[Melinda Lontoc-Roy]

There has been one change. When the program was first designed, the stacking limit—the maximum contribution from all level of governments together—was at 50%. That limit has increased to 75%, and the cap at 50% remains for federal dollars only.

[Kevin Stringer]

That was something that was really a request of the people who are using the program.

I should also mention that we're coming to the end of the first couple of years of this program and are doing an assessment of it. Do we have the funding right, the types of projects right, and are all the eligibility requirements that Melinda just spoke to basically right, or are there adjustments needed? We'll be working with the stakeholders on that assessment and certainly look forward to the advice of this committee in your study, which may assist us as well.

[Patricia Davidson, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Thank you, Mrs. Davidson.

Mr. Kamp.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I have just two questions, and you can handle them if you like.

First of all, can you tell me what sort of legislative, regulatory, or policy guidelines DFO has in place to be able to determine how the recreational catch should relate to, for example, commercial or first nations requirements? Do we have that kind of guideline? How is that process conducted to decide who gets what?

Second, conventional wisdom would seem to indicate that it's harder to monitor what the recreational fishermen and women do. How do we do that so that we have some sense of what they're catching, and are able to make sure that sustainable practices are being carried out?

[Kevin Stringer]

Managing the recreational and commercial fisheries together, and figuring out how they connect, and what portion goes to which is a challenge. I would say it's been more of an issue on the west coast than on the east coast, generally. I would also say that we have more of a formal integration of our processes for providing advice to the minister and the department from stakeholders on the west coast than we do on the east coast. For salmon and other west coast species—but salmon in particular—we have an integrated harvest committee that has commercial, recreational, and aboriginal representation. We try to have those groups come together and sort out, at those tables, how we're going to manage the overall fishery issues about shares. But as you point out, other issues are addressed in those fora.

We tend not to have that on the east coast. On the east coast, there is a pretty well-established process for how we address Atlantic salmon. There is an established process for how we address striped bass, recently established because it has just come back, but we don't have those integrated harvest tables.

In terms of a framework, we do have a formal framework. We actually have an operational policy with respect to how we manage recreational fisheries. It is from 2001. It hasn't been refreshed for a while. I don't think some of the things we've talked about today are reflected in it, such as charter fisheries, derbies, and those types of things which are new, emerging, and certainly growing.

To be candid, I would say it is sometimes hit-and-miss in terms of how we address it on the east coast.

Monitoring is an issue. Whereas, on the west coast you have 300,000 recreational license holders, we're not getting 300,000 responses, nor are we seeking them. We have to be strategic and tactical in terms of how we do that. It means working with lodges because they account for a significant part of it. It means working with the sports fish advisory board and the SFI, the Sport Fishing Institute, to come up with new, innovative ways to monitor. There have been a couple of tests out there in the past couple of years, on the west coast in particular, to be able to monitor.

We have creel surveys. Creel surveys are basically a conservation and protection officer, or a fisheries officer, or someone from the department sitting down with individual fishermen and asking how much they caught that day, how much they caught that week, and addressing those types of things. We have a number of mechanisms, and then we have our five-year survey, which tells us what's happening and gives us the trend. All of that goes into scientific advice. But monitoring is a challenge, and it is one that we continue to work on.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Mr. Stringer, I'd like to thank you and your colleagues for appearing here today. We certainly do appreciate your comments and the time you took to answer our questions.

There being no further business, this committee now stands adjourned.