Fisheries Committee on Feb. 4th, 2019

[Larry Miller]

Okay.

Just to go in a different direction, Mr. Nishidate, you mentioned in your comments “unintended consequences”.

Could you name some of these, so that the whole committee understands where you're coming from.

[John Nishidate]

Among unintended consequences, for example, is the question of what you do with generational passing down of licences from father to son. We have situations, with sea urchins, in which that happens: their sons fish it.

How do you keep that knowledge in that fishery, then? Urchins is a very specific fishery.

[Larry Miller]

Mr. Bird, I think you used the word “inequities”, and you meant inequities, maybe, in the way DFO treats recreational fisheries vis-à-vis the commercial fisheries. Both industries are very important, as we know, but we've known for years that the commercial fishery is just under $3 billion a year, which is huge, but the sport fishery is $8.3 billion and has been for some time.

Is the sport fishery being treated fairly by DFO?

[Owen Bird]

I think I provided a bit of a theory to explain what is behind that, and that's the predisposition of the department to serve and manage commercial fisheries. I understand that this is the design of Fisheries, but to an observer and participant in all of the fisheries, it is quite clear, from the attention dedicated to the management of recreational fisheries and to their relationship with commercial and even first nations fisheries, the recreational sector often takes a back seat or can be used as a bit of a shill to allow certain measures to take place to agree on conservation issues, even though the recreational sector's impacts are lower by any standard.

[The Chair]

Thank you, Mr. Miller. Your time has gone over a little bit.

Going back to the government side, for five minutes or less, we have Mr. Fraser.

[Colin Fraser, West Nova, Lib.]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'll be sharing my time with Mr. Casey.

Thanks, everybody, for being here today. I really appreciate you coming and testifying for our study.

Mr. Young, I want to go back to something you mentioned earlier, regarding a competitive disadvantage in the the groundfish off B.C. with no MSC certification—this is a competitive disadvantage, I take it, with our U.S. neighbours.

[Phil Young]

Yes.

[Colin Fraser]

You'd said that the government can help out in getting that MSC certification. Has that been flagged for DFO at this point, as to what they could actually do in order to help? Is there any movement in that direction? If that is the direction the government should be going, what can this committee recommend to the government in order to help get MSC-certified groundfish?

[Phil Young]

Yes, it is being flagged with the government. I believe they do have an interest in helping us. They have had those stock assessments in the queue for a couple of years now. Unfortunately, with the Species at Risk Act, there are timelines associated with them. When something gets recommended by COSEWIC as a species at risk, that jumps the queue, and they then become the priority, so they have to do those stock assessments.

We have seen groundfish slip for two years, some of them for three years. The department has to answer the other ones because there's a strict timeline for the Species at Risk Act.

[Colin Fraser]

Just to be clear, what species are you referring to when you say the groundfish?

[Phil Young]

For us, it's different types of rockfish. We have rougheye, widows and a few different ones. We needed to do individual stock assessments of different rockfish.

[Colin Fraser]

All right. Thank you.

John, you talked about the harvesting of sea urchins and sea cucumbers. I know that where I'm from in Nova Scotia, those fisheries are emerging potentials for exporting to Asian markets and Europe, as you mentioned. I'm wondering if you could help us understand the growth potential for those fisheries in particular, and if there's anything this committee could do in order to support new or emerging species that have significant growth potential.

[John Nishidate]

For sea urchins, it's a little bit different from regular fish. You never know what you have until you crack it open. It's like a box of chocolates. Basically, we pay fishermen more for quality, and we choose not to hire some fishermen, because we know their quality is not good. That's part of why we also own licences and designate licences to particular fishermen.

Sea cucumber is a bit different as well. It's typically in conjunction with another fishery, such as geoduck or sea urchin. It's the same skill type.

As far as what the committee can do—

[Colin Fraser]

Yes. Is there anything specifically that you think the government could do to help make any emerging species more valuable? Are there licensing problems or quota problems with those in particular?

[John Nishidate]

There are. Experimental licences, and things like that, take quite a long time to get, submit and process. I know, for example, that there was a hagfish fishery on the west coast they were trying to get going. They had a lot of problems with doing the science and everything else for that.

Help with experimental licences would be great.

[Colin Fraser]

Thanks.

We'll leave it there. I'll pass to Mr. Casey.

[The Chair]

You have one minute, Sean.

[Sean Casey, Charlottetown, Lib.]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'm a little concerned, and I want to direct my questions around some of the testimony we've heard with respect to the approach of the department to science, and their objective of conservation and the sustainability of stocks.

I want to start with you, Mr. Young. You singled out the herring fishery as a shining example of one where the science is respected, and if the science says we don't fish, then we don't fish. Is it unique in that regard? Isn't that the case with all of them?

[Phil Young]

I think it's just had more years of science on a very localized area. Industry pays a lot every year to do surveys, because the fish all come back into one area, or into the five areas of the coast. They are congregated. You can look at the spawn surveys. You can do that type of work. I think it's one that's easier to measure. Salmon used to be that way, but I believe the in-stream work for salmon is nowhere near what it used to be, to look at what we're actually getting for returns.

[The Chair]

Thank you, Mr. Casey.

I guess when Mr. Fraser said that he would share his time he didn't mean equally. Perhaps we'll get back to you again.

Now from the Conservative side, Mr. Carrie.

[Colin Carrie, Oshawa, CPC]

I think Mel is going to go first.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

I'll try to split my time with Mr. Carrie as well.

Mr. Sporer, I believe you were alluding to some of the stock assessments that were taking place on groundfish and so on. You were saying it's because of some of the COSEWIC priorities that have come forward.

DFO has promised some stock assessments for all of these key fish stocks. Has the department been able to do these assessments?

[Chris Sporer]

It was Mr. Young who mentioned it, but I can speak to it. In the halibut fishery, our science is done through the International Pacific Halibut Commission. For species we catch as bycatch, for instance some rockfish species, that science is done by DFO. For example, in our Marine Stewardship Council certification, we have our fisheries certified, but we had a condition on the lack of a stock assessment on rougheye rockfish, which probably was 20 years out of date. There are some real deficiencies on the groundfish side. In the fishery Mr. Young was speaking about, the groundfish troll, even though our fisheries I think are managed and monitored to a much higher standard than other fisheries, because of a lack of these stock assessments, it can't get the Marine Stewardship Council certification and it's at a disadvantage in the market.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

Phil, did you have anything you wanted to add on that?

[Phil Young]

He summed it up nicely, Mr. Arnold.