I will hand it off to Martin, but I'll begin.
Hello, and thank you for the opportunity to appear before this committee once again.
My name is Owen Bird and my colleague is Martin Paish. We're here to talk about the study of the regulation of the west coast fisheries, and we both represent the Sport Fishing Institute of British Columbia, or the SFI.
I'll take a moment to provide details about our organization and about the values of sport fishery in British Columbia and our continued interest in seeing the sector provided with appropriate resources to be effectively managed and to maximize opportunities. Martin will detail our concerns and specific experiences with quota.
The SFI is a non-profit association that represents the interests of 300,000 licensed tidal water anglers in B.C. and the hundreds of businesses that support them. According to the 2016 provincial sector report, sport fishing and related businesses produce $1.1 billion in annual sales and create more than 9,000 jobs and 3,950 person-years of employment, resulting in a $398-million contribution to the province's GDP.
Sport fishery is the single largest economic driver of all B.C. fisheries, even though anglers take only 15% of the annual halibut catch and less than 10% of the annual salmon harvest. As of 2010, the last update to the Fisheries and Oceans national recreational fishing survey—a survey that has been conducted every five years since 1975—said the sport fishing contribution to the Canadian economy was $8.3 billion annually. Yet efforts by the department to entrench reliable opportunity for the recreational sector—a very different requirement than for purely harvest-based fisheries—have been minimal.
It has long appeared that the ability to meet the unique needs of the recreational sector are affected by the predisposition of the department to focus on the management of commercial fisheries. While it is acknowledged that the largest harvester should receive the greatest attention, we believe it is also reasonable that the fishery that produces a significantly higher value per fish, is responsible for only an estimated 4% of all fish harvested in Canada and touches the lives socially and economically of millions of Canadians would receive an appropriate level of dedicated resources to manage it to best advantage.
In recognition of the different needs of the sector—reliability and opportunity—it would be reasonable to consider fishing plans with those needs in mind. However, what we've seen over many years and by governments previous to this one is diminished funding and attention to the recreational sector. As an example, while national policy and fisheries management directives explain that catch monitoring is critical to sound management, the funds made available for those purposes for the recreational sector have been continually eroded.
However, we continue to be optimistic that the recreational vision—a co-operatively developed proposal to provide appropriate funding to the management of recreational fisheries and to recognize the values and unique needs of the sector—will be adopted and implemented.