Fisheries Committee on May 17th, 2016

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

How much time do I have left, Chair?

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Robert Sopuck]

You have one and a half minutes.

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

Thank you.

We've heard something about smolt survival rates and so on. Are you aware of any programs or pilot projects that have possibly looked at smolt-rearing in the ocean, in the estuaries? I know there are cases on Vancouver Island and definitely on the west coast where they have done some preliminary studies. Have there been any studies to that effect on the east coast?

This question could be for anyone in the group.

[Mark Hambrook]

I could answer that.

Yes, there has been a number of projects. There's one on the Conne River in Newfoundland, where they captured wild smolts, put them in a cage in the bay, and reared them up to adults. It's a well-known technology. The aquaculture industry does it every day.

In the Bay of Fundy, this is the other way they're bringing back their salmon: they're catching wild smolts on those small Bay of Fundy rivers, putting them in sea cages, and growing them up to be adults. That works, because in the Bay of Fundy, and of course on the coast of Newfoundland, the waters are warm enough that you can run a cage there year-round. For the Miramichi, our salt water gets too cold in the winter. Salmon won't survive. If we want to do it, we have to do it in land-based facilities.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Robert Sopuck]

That's seven minutes.

Mr. Donnelly, you have seven minutes.

[Fin Donnelly, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

Thank you to all our witnesses for being here on this important subject.

Dr. Fuller, you referenced the impacts of aquaculture on wild Atlantic salmon. I want to start by asking you what you believe would be an effective solution to that concern.

[Susanna Fuller]

I think one of the most effective solutions would be to ensure that there's not siting of open net-pen farms within a scientifically determined distance from salmon-bearing rivers. There's been some research on that. There's a paper by Ford et al. from about six years ago that points out that, around the world, when you put open net-pen salmon farms next to salmon-bearing rivers, you get a 50% additional mortality rate.

I think siting and designing where we put the farms is extremely important in ensuring that they are not within a distance that can actually impact wild salmon returns. I think it's important to ensure that we are addressing the sea lice issue to make sure there's less density in the farms so that you don't have a complete outbreak of sea lice. Controlling and reporting on disease is very important. I think there needs to be an incredible lot more transparency in the open net-pen farming industry so that we can actually figure out how to address the cumulative impacts on wild salmon.

Again, I go back to siting as the key one. We really just cannot put the farms next to salmon-bearing rivers. I think there needs to be some science, and maybe the reinvestment by DFO in salmon could help determine how far that distance should be.

Those would be my key recommendations.

[Fin Donnelly, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

Does your organization have a position on closed containment?

[Susanna Fuller]

We do. We support closed containment for a number of reasons. One is that it means that the externalities to the marine environment writ large are eliminated. The closed containment industry has to, in their business model, pay for all the externalities.

Also, there's been some very successful closed containment both on the west coast and the east coast. I would note that a lot of hatcheries are more or less closed containment, and growing out of the smolts happens in more or less closed containment.

The biggest issue for us is the impacts on the environment. They come for free. I think very few other agricultural or farming industries get those kinds of services for free and have to pay so little. I think $12.18 a hectare is an embarrassment. Really, in terms of the municipalities who should be able to gain from those industries, I think that if we're going to have open net-pen fish farming, the externalities have to be paid for, and that's not happening right now.

[Fin Donnelly, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

In terms of DFO's management plan for wild Atlantic salmon, would you say it's working. If not, what are the two top actions you would recommend the department take?

[Susanna Fuller]

I am less familiar with the in-river management plan. I think the other witnesses speaking here today are much more familiar with that, because our organization is not an angling or a restoration organization.

I would say, from my experience, that sometimes the elephant in the room does not get dealt with—and that elephant would be the aquaculture industry. I think we often think that if we improve river habitat.... We still have this unknown that is at-sea mortality, which I do not think we've adequately addressed. I think some of the tagging studies are really good. I think looking at the take in the Greenland salmon commercial fisheries is important.

However, I'd say that we have turned a bit of a blind eye to the impacts of the farmed salmon industry and its improper and irresponsible regulation in Atlantic Canada, particularly compared to other salmon-farming countries such as Norway and Scotland that really make an effort to keep their farms away from salmon-bearing rivers. They still have problems, but we have a long way to go in regulating the open net-pen farming industry so that we at least can understand and decide on the risks that we are willing to take for Atlantic salmon.

[Fin Donnelly, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

Mr. Irving, you mentioned that critical funding to save the wild Atlantic salmon is still needed, and you mentioned that we're in a crisis in this regard. Could I get your comments about the DFO management plan, if you think it's working, and one or two top actions you would recommend the department take?

[James D. Irving]

I preface my remarks based on what we're doing here with the Gulf region, because I don't want to be overcritical of DFO, since I don't have the experience. Also, I haven't been active on that side of it with DFO.

In the last 18 months I've been active, along with the rest of the CAST executive, trying to get things done, and it's been terrible. This is an organization that's funded with federal tax dollars, and I see what we've gone through trying to make something happen. It's not right. We need to be much more progressive.

The federal minister just announced another almost $200 million in funding. That's great, but we should not squander the money. We'd better be held to account. DFO should be held to account with measurable outcomes every year, and not just answer a question with another question and go on a circular discussion. We've better [Technical difficulty--Editor] and we know that, and the Province of New Brunswick particularly. We should be very proactive.

We need a different type of thinking, as far as I'm concerned. I'm being candid with you. I don't want to be unduly hard on the DFO, but I can tell you that locally—whether it's mid level or what level is in charge, I don't know—we're not forward thinking. We're not working with a goal and an objective. We need to have a sense of purpose. I can't emphasize that enough with you.

[Fin Donnelly, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

Great. Thank you very much, Mr. Irving.

Mr. Hambrook, you talked about stocking the river with hatchery salmon, and you mentioned striped bass and grey seals' predation. I wonder if you would apply your recommendation to deal with these issues to different river basins across the country.

[Mark Hambrook]

My recommendation is that we'd like to see our ecosystem in balance. It's nice to let things go natural, but man has interfered so much that we have to try to maintain that balance. When the number of striped bass has gone from 2,000 to over 300,000 in a decade, that's changing the ecosystem.

We see grey seals that have gone from a few thousand to several hundred thousand in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. It's well reported by DFO that the seals are impeding the recovery of the cod stocks and other groundfish. It's out of balance.

We need to get a balance.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Robert Sopuck]

I'm afraid the time is up. Thank you very much, Mr. Hambrook.

Ms. Jordan, for seven minutes.

[Bernadette Jordan, Liberal, South Shore—St. Margarets, NS]

I have a number of questions. I'm going to start with Mr. Doak.

The 2015 ministerial advisory report on Atlantic salmon stressed that there was a lot of illegal fishing and poaching of Atlantic salmon in Canada. Can you tell me some of the things that have been done in your region to try to mitigate those problems?

[Jerry Doak]

I'm not aware of a great deal of specific effort to that end, other than routine patrols—and there's probably fewer of those than there used to be. There's quite a bit of concern about the decline in enforcement personnel at a time when, I would contend, frivolous regulations are being imposed and enforcement personnel are being asked to enforce them. There is perhaps a depletion of the concentrated enforcement effort on the real issue, which would be the interception of large egg-bearing female salmon.

I think that as a result of the measures that were taken last year, out of every 20 people who were driven off the river in frustration, probably one of them took out their frustration by perhaps taking home a fish they otherwise would not have taken. That concerns me because so much of management involves considering the people and what's going to be supported on a compliance basis. When people have a complaint, they're not always complying, and a lot of that has to with where you move the letter “i” around in those two words.

We don't do ourselves any favours when we enact a regulation simply because we can, without thinking about the impact it's going to have. I don't have specifics on the amount of poaching, but I do know there were rumours last year that there were more large salmon lost to poaching than would otherwise have been the case. That is a concern.

[Bernadette Jordan, Liberal, South Shore—St. Margarets, NS]

Mr. Hambrook, you had mentioned that your salmon association spend $1 million annually. Is that correct?

[Mark Hambrook]

That is correct.

[Bernadette Jordan, Liberal, South Shore—St. Margarets, NS]

What do you spend that money on?

Is it on the hatchery and what else? Can you expand on that a little bit more?

[Mark Hambrook]

We have a host of field programs. Over the past number of a years, we've been doing an inventory on the number of smolts migrating to the ocean. We put traps in and count those. We remove beaver dams in the fall to allow salmon to access prime tributaries. We do an electrofishing program with Fisheries and Oceans, where these index sites are done on an annual basis, as they have been for the last 50 years. We provide the bulk of the manpower to do that. We're involved in cold water pool restoration work. We helped DFO in the adult assessment by tagging fish and participating in the mark and recapture for assessments.

With our facility, our hatchery, we host a lot of research students; we provide fish for studies; and we do a number of things in that regard.

[Bernadette Jordan, Liberal, South Shore—St. Margarets, NS]

Are you involved at all with the CAST program?

[Mark Hambrook]

Yes, I am.

[Bernadette Jordan, Liberal, South Shore—St. Margarets, NS]

The association is?