Fisheries Committee on Sept. 26th, 2016

[Bettina Saier]

I think it's a critical time now to implement these sustainability measures. The Newfoundland cod product, as we heard many times today and at our action plan meeting this morning, is a product that is wanted in the world. It's a high-end product. It is a critical time now to make the transition. It will probably take some time, but I'm very hopeful that we will get to a point where the industry is less polarized and we develop one vision.

That is dependent also on what the market wants. The market will, to a certain degree, prescribe what sustainability measures we will be implementing. I'm hopeful, and I think the next five years are critical to making that happen.

[Pat Finnigan, Liberal, Miramichi—Grand Lake, NB]

Thank you.

More to the research side now, we do a lot of research in DFO. You've invested a lot of resources, and we're going to invest more resources. How are we sharing that information, or gathering information from other countries that are similar to ours, such as Norway, Iceland, and even Russia? Do we share that? Do they have techniques that we could use? Would you comment on that, please?

[Dr. Pierre Pepin]

Scientists are constantly looking at what others are doing. That's part of our training. That's part of what we do. Innovation is an important element in any region, because your patch of water will be different from the neighbour's patch of water, but we have a number of collaborative projects. A couple of weeks from now, I'm flying to Norway to take part in a comparative study. A number of scientists from this region will actually be contributing information, and we'll be getting information back. The idea is to have joint projects like that, that build on what the other guys do. One of the problems is that we can't do everything. This is the only way we can progress and stop from reinventing the wheel all the time.

We also have to keep in mind the differences among systems. We spend a great deal of time trying to do that. There are some countries where it's easier to share. Norwegians are really good about it, the Russians less so. That's just a cultural issue more than anything else. We collaborate with the Spanish and Portuguese as well. I've been on NAFO working groups very often.

The marine science community is small. We like to work together, because we don't have a choice. That's how we build. That's how we foster knowledge. I've been on a number of international panels where the reason we work together is to build on everybody else's information. That's traditional in science, and it's particularly significant in marine science as well, because there are so few of us.

[Pat Finnigan, Liberal, Miramichi—Grand Lake, NB]

Continuing on that line, do you feel that other countries...? Fish might not know that there is a border or a 200-mile limit. Do you feel there is proper management from other countries while they fish, you know, off the...?

[Dr. Pierre Pepin]

The long-distance migrations we hear about are mostly for very large species that undergo very long migrations. Tuna, being one of them, crosses the Atlantic on a regular basis a couple of times a year. Most of the stocks we deal with in this region, cod, flatfish, and capelin, will undertake migrations that may be on the order of several thousands of kilometres, but they won't necessarily cross the ocean, per se.

We've seen very little evidence that the cod stock in our region, for instance, actually influences anything we see in Greenland. Along our shelf, from Labrador to here, we do see those kinds of interactions. We do see that kind of migration. But for most of the species, the migrations are a little bit more restrained, and the broad-scale dispersal from one country to the next tends to be very close to the boundary most of the time.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Thank you, Mr. Pepin.

That discussion reminds me of my predecessor member of Parliament, who was once quoted as saying that fish could be managed a lot easier if they'd only stop swimming.

Mr. Arnold, you have five minutes, please.

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

Thank you. I may split my time with Mr. Doherty as well.

Mr. Wiseman, you got cut short a little bit in your presentation when you got around to size restrictions on boats. I'm somewhat familiar with this. I've been a boatbuilder for years. A proposition came to our convention this year, but I'm not sure whether or not you're talking about the same one.

Are the size restrictions on boats to limit the capacity for harvest? Are they to limit the range? Why are the limits there? Perhaps you can explain more on that.

[Mervin Wiseman]

I've been looking at it for the last 30 years and I'm not entirely sure I understand the answer to that. It's almost a rhetorical question. The rationale that I've heard about using it as a management tool is that it does limit the capacity and hence limits the pressure you would have on a resource.

The irony is that because of innovation, creativity, call it what you will, they've never done anything to limit the hold size. We now have a situation where we have 45-footers with excessively more carrying capacity than a 65-footer or even a 95-footer. It's a really bizarre situation that I've never been able to get my head around.

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

We should probably look at hold capacity rather than boat size as a limiting factor.

[Mervin Wiseman]

Yes, absolutely. When we're talking about restricting size for issues of safety, we're also putting serious limitations on quality, and on ergonomics and crew comfort, and so on.

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

It's a roundabout way of limiting capacity, catch capacity. Through all of this, I'm quite surprised at the lack of knowledge we've seen so far, lack of testimony, about the cod’s predator-prey relationships and their relationship with their prey. I'm not sure whether there's going to be more forthcoming or if Mr. Pepin can provide more on that. After 25 years of moratorium, I'm quite surprised that there isn't more data around this. What competes with the cod for prey, what do cod prey on, and so on?

[Dr. Pierre Pepin]

I can provide you with a partial answer. We are looking at the diet of potential competitors such turbot and American plaice and trying to track the changes in their diet over time. Part of the issue is that it's very difficult to reconstruct the past, when we have no data. We have a few years of data that we started as part of an ecosystem research initiative several years ago, where we started collecting data on the stomach content of key players, including capelin and sand lance, in the system. We have gained some knowledge, but you need to get enough of a change in the system to be able to understand those types of interactions.

I am involved right now in a project where we're looking at effective changes in zooplankton prey availability, the small crustaceans in the water column, and their effect on the condition of capelin in the region. Based on the data that we have we can go back to the 1990s with that kind of information. It is promising because we have detected some signals. But part of the issue is that there are many questions to address and it's been a challenge in the last few years to be able to address them all to the extent that is needed. But there are some data that are available to do that.

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

I don't want to sound like a broken record, but when the Europeans stocks didn't collapse as far as ours, were there some comparables there?

[Dr. Pierre Pepin]

Actually, that's one of the areas that we're going to be discussing in a couple of weeks when we go to Norway. It's very strange. Europeans collect a lot of data, but there are aspects they don't collect data on. Size at age and weight at age are some of the data that are often missing. In the last few years, they've been collecting more of that, so there's going to be more of a comparison between the data that we have in this region and the data they have off Norway.

[Todd Doherty, Conservative, Cariboo—Prince George, BC]

Over the course of the moratorium, how prevalent were foreign fishers' incursions into our waters for poaching?

[Dr. Pierre Pepin]

I'm not a fisheries management person, but I can tell you that it probably wasn't all that much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

We do have a few minutes left.

We'll go to Mr. Johns for three minutes, please.

[Gord Johns, NDP, Courtenay—Alberni, BC]

Ms. Saier, your document says fishing goes much deeper than just a means to earning a living. I wanted you to talk a little bit more about the social and cultural indicators that might help manage the recovery of cod. We had Ms. Orren speak earlier about the education and connection piece. We've also had Mr. Cobb talk about the co-op model and integrating the community into the whole fishery. Maybe you could discuss these matters with us.

[Bettina Saier]

Yes, it's an area we're exploring. I think there are some good examples in other jurisdictions, like the U.S. for example, for a stronger inclusion of social indicators in fisheries policy. It is a bit of a slippery slope, or can be, because management decisions should really be primarily guided by science. But then the social components are currently, of course, playing a major role in the decisions, and they should be playing a major role.

What it exactly looks like we don't know, but we're talking about, really, stronger inclusion of social science so that the decisions that are made based on science also help the communities thrive.

[Gord Johns, NDP, Courtenay—Alberni, BC]

Great. I think I'm good.

Thanks, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Okay. That concludes this portion of the panel.

I want to thank the panel members for coming in and bringing their presentations with them. We really appreciate the work you've put into them. Certainly this is going to go a long way in our report.

We're going to break now for about 10 minutes. At the top of the hour, at four o'clock, we will have the witnesses we agreed upon earlier this morning. We're suspended until four o'clock.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Okay, folks. This is our last session of the day. This is what we would call, in the most affectionate way possible, the overflow crowd.

[A voice]

It's overtime.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Yes, this is overtime.

We want to thank our guests for arriving.

Members, I trust you've all received these bios, as requested by Mr. Doherty. We have bios on the three individuals in front of us: Jason Sullivan, a 33-year-old fisherman from Bay Bulls, who holds a fishing master first class and bachelor of maritime studies; Gus Etchegary, who has extensive experience in the fisheries management or business management and was and still is the chair of the Fisheries Community Alliance; and, of course, no stranger to this committee, a former member of Parliament and of this committee, Ryan Cleary.

Mr. Cleary, it's good to see you as well.

We're going to do 10 minutes each and try to stick as close to that as we can. We all want to get out in time for the fisheries broadcast at six o'clock, I'm sure, or at least some of us want to.

Mr. Cleary, how about we go with you first? Go ahead, please, for 10 minutes.

[Ryan Cleary, As an Individual]

Good afternoon, Mr. Chair, members of Parliament, welcome to St. John's.

My name, as the chair pointed out, is Ryan Cleary, and I'm the former member of Parliament for St. John's South—Mount Pearl. I served in the last Parliament from 2011 to 2015, and I spent most of that time on the House of Commons Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans.

We did a fair number of studies, but the committee only travelled once, and that travel wasn't to any province in Canada, but to Washington D.C. as part of a study on closed containment aquaculture. You can study a problem to death in an Ottawa boardroom, but you can't underestimate the impact of being on the ground, and I think all MPs and the chair will agree with that. When I say, welcome, I sincerely mean it, and I hope to see you here often in Newfoundland and Labrador, Mr. Simms.

I speak to you today, first, as a former journalist. I covered the northern cod moratorium on July 2, 1992, when John Crosbie shut down the fishery, and I worked for the local daily newspaper The Telegram. The front page headline of the next day's paper—I pulled it out last night; I kept a copy—read, “No Fishing: 19,000 out of work in northern cod ban”. That was 19,000 direct jobs on the water and in fish plants. That did not include spin-off jobs. The total number of job losses as a result of the northern cod moratorium was estimated at closer to 30,000, and that was compared to the dust bowl that swept thousands of prairie farmers from the land in the 1930s. The moratorium was initially supposed to last two years, and as you know, it's been 24 years. Newfoundland and Labrador has lost an estimated 80,000 people in those 24 years.

One of the biggest concerns back then was what was termed “transfer of effort”. It was feared that the intense fishing effort that had been directed at northern cod would be redirected to the next species, and then the next species, and then the next species, until there was nothing left in the north Atlantic. Thankfully, that hasn't happened, as you know, although the health of other stocks like shrimp, crab, and capelin have fluctuated wildly.

I also speak to you today as one of the leaders of the Federation of Independent Sea Harvesters, or FISH-NL. FISH-NL has been described as a breakaway union. Most fishery workers in Newfoundland and Labrador, including fish harvesters, fish plant workers, and offshore trawlermen are currently represented by the FFAW, the president of which was here and spoke before you earlier today. We see that as a conflict of interest. Fish harvesters specifically want to break away and form their own stand-alone union, FISH-NL, and that will play out over the coming months.

Part of the reason fish harvesters are ready to revolt in this province is consultation, and the fact that there isn't any. This year's northern cod stewardship fishery is a prime example of that. The absence of consultation has resulted in a northern cod fishery that puts the lives of harvesters at greater risk, and has led to the dumping of untold thousands of pounds of northern cod.

FISH-NL has held meetings around Newfoundland in the past few weeks. These meetings have involved hundreds of fishermen, fish harvesters, and I have yet to meet a single one who said they were consulted about this year's northern cod fishery. Fish harvesters say the one-year management plan has resulted in thousands of pounds of northern cod being left dead in the water. This year's fishery eliminated the individual quota, or IQ system, in favour of an extended season with weekly landing limits. Harvesters could take 2,000 pounds of cod from mid-August to early September, and 3,000 pounds of cod a week from early September until the end of the season.

Harvesters all-to-often reach their weekly quota when they still have gillnets in the water. As a result, when all the nets are hauled, thousands of pounds of dead cod are left in the ocean. Harvesters don't exceed their quota, so they're not charged with overfishing. Fish harvesters have a theory that the cod fishery was stretched out over more weeks, so the FFAW could collect more union dues. Harvesters see no other logical explanation.

Safety is also an issue because, with only 2,000 to 3,000 pounds of fish to take a week, it doesn't make economic sense to take a longliner or a bigger boat out to catch cod, not when you have to pay your crew and your expenses.

Harvesters say they're being forced into smaller boats, which obviously aren't as safe. Earlier this month, four fishermen from Shea Heights—that's a neighbourhood right here in St. John's—were lost in a 22-foot open boat not far from St. John's harbour.

I was also eager to appear before this committee to alert federal politicians, such as yourselves, and the Government of Canada to a growing crisis of confidence in the Newfoundland and Labrador fishery involving the FFAW, their union. On the one hand, the FFAW is responsible for holding the Government of Canada to account for day-to-day management decisions and overall fishery policy. On the other hand, the FFAW takes in untold millions of dollars a year from various federal government departments and agencies to administer various fisheries programs, so there's a conflict of interest to begin with in terms of the FFAW representing fish plant workers and fish harvesters. But the added element of conflict of interest and government funds undermines faith in the industry. Normal checks and balances that accompany a regular union-management dynamic can be compromised when funds change hands between the two, negatively impacting the entire fishing industry.

I wrote to the Auditor General of Canada earlier this summer and I asked the Auditor General to investigate federal funds directed to the FFAW, but his office declined, referring concerns to DFO auditors, which is another conflict.

I heard earlier today presentations by the president of the FFAW and the provincial minister of fisheries. Both the union and the provincial fisheries department have outlined the science roles they've taken on, and they've taken on these science roles because the federal government hasn't been doing its job. It hasn't been doing the work. But it's the Government of Canada that's responsible for the harvesting sector, as has been made clear today. The Government of Canada is responsible for proper management. The lines between the function of the fishermen's union, the federal government, and the provincial government have all been blurred. We need to bring those roles back into focus. To quote a fisherman in an article that appears in the local news just today, “The union now is DFO to us....” Who the manager is is not exactly clear.

The Government of Canada must be made to live up to its responsibilities to manage the fish stocks. That means good science, that means proper enforcement, and it means a sound management structure. But 24 years after the northern cod moratorium was handed down, we're only now, as there's a sign that cod are coming back, taking a good look at a management plan. From my perspective, from the perspective of a former parliamentarian and as a Newfoundlander and Labradorian, we should be ashamed.