Evidence of meeting #25 for Fisheries and Oceans in the 42nd Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was pots.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Killam Memorial Chair in Fish, Fisheries and Oceans, Department of Biology, Dalhousie University, As an Individual
Well, it depends which fisher.
Killam Memorial Chair in Fish, Fisheries and Oceans, Department of Biology, Dalhousie University, As an Individual
I've interviewed a lot of them over time and found some fascinating information that, for example, DFO never captured.
Killam Memorial Chair in Fish, Fisheries and Oceans, Department of Biology, Dalhousie University, As an Individual
There were changes in fishing effort over time. I interviewed inshore fishermen from Bonavista down along to the southern shore, and I basically asked them questions about how they changed their gear and how their mesh sizes in the gillnets changed over time. What about the size of their cod traps or the design of their cod traps? Did they have to fish farther and farther away from shore? Did they have to leave their gillnets out for longer and longer periods of time?
It was only by asking the fishermen those questions, one on one, that a pattern emerged.
Killam Memorial Chair in Fish, Fisheries and Oceans, Department of Biology, Dalhousie University, As an Individual
No. It might become and I would argue it should become part of a new management scenario, but it wasn't part of the management scenario of the seventies and eighties, to quantify spacial and temporal changes in fishing effort and changes to fishing gear.
Executive Director, Oceana Canada
I'm just going to go where Dr. Hutchings went at the end. I mean, when we do it badly, we pit science against the knowledge of the people in the industry.
Executive Director, Oceana Canada
It's not a great spot. When we do it well, we integrate information from the users into our science model, so the science is better, and that's where Dr. Hutchings was going at the end. I shouldn't put words in his mouth.
That seems to me the way out: to find better and better ways to integrate that information, rather than pitting the one against the other.
Liberal
Bobby Morrissey Liberal Egmont, PE
I have one final question. You referenced that there's no legislative mandate for a recovery plan, I believe, in the Fisheries Act. I'm paraphrasing. Yet you referenced the U.S. Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act as being a reference. Does the U.S. not have problems with cod stocks off the east coast and various other fisheries stocks that are collapsing or near collapse as well?
Executive Director, Oceana Canada
I think the U.S. has all sorts of problems with its fisheries too. There are things that are going well and things going badly, but the one thing they have a better record on is rebuilding stocks that have—
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Scott Simms
I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to close it out right there. I apologize.
I should have been clear earlier, when I said to put up your hand if you want to weigh in on a topic. You have to get the members' attention because, when they get their block of time, they own the floor. It's theirs. It's not mine to butt in, even though I just butted in. Sorry.
Mr. Doherty, you have five minutes, please.
Conservative
Todd Doherty Conservative Cariboo—Prince George, BC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Favaro, how much do the pots cost on average?
Research Scientist, Fisheries and Marine Institute, Memorial University of Newfoundland, As an Individual
That's a great question with a complicated answer, because right now we're in the prototype phase for a lot of these. We built them by hand. I mean, it's conceivable that you could get these things down to the low hundred-dollar range. It depends where you want to get them built. It depends how you want to do the labour. Do you want to get them built in China and brought in? Do you want to try to build them locally? These are all sort of other questions that will factor into that answer.
That's once we all settle on the exact type of pot that we would want to use in a fishery like this, and there's a lot of options there too.
Conservative
Todd Doherty Conservative Cariboo—Prince George, BC
Mr. Favaro, I saw your video and I too want to commend you for your cinematography. I would like to ask how much time you spent on boats at Fogo Island and with the fishers in Gander?
Research Scientist, Fisheries and Marine Institute, Memorial University of Newfoundland, As an Individual
We spend a couple of weeks a year up there and we have a research team up there a little bit longer than that. We go there for when the commercial fishery opens, during that time, but we go up at other times a year as well just to check in with the local harvesters and see what people's priorities are.
Conservative
Todd Doherty Conservative Cariboo—Prince George, BC
Okay.
Mr. Hutchings, I have the same question for you. How much time have you spent on the boats out in the water with the local fishers?
Killam Memorial Chair in Fish, Fisheries and Oceans, Department of Biology, Dalhousie University, As an Individual
Well, in the last 20 years, none.
Conservative
Todd Doherty Conservative Cariboo—Prince George, BC
Okay. Thank you.
Mr. Laughren and Mr. Rangeley, I have the same question for you. How much time have you spent on the water with the local fishers?