Fisheries Committee on Nov. 23rd, 2017

[Ken McDonald, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

In the escaped trout instance, what would happen if they end up breeding with wild trout in any of the areas of the rivers or in the ocean, for example?

[Tom Smith]

Obviously, that's not a good thing. Through work with the Nova Scotia government, we have a committee that the minister chairs. We call it the salmon traceability committee. We are looking at DNA marking for all finfish aquaculture in the province of Nova Scotia, so that we can trace any salmon or trout that escape into the wild and identify it back to the farm where it came from.

To date, we haven't seen any salmon go back up the rivers in Nova Scotia, under that policy, but we are committed right now, as an industry, to putting that traceability program in place.

[Ken McDonald, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

Thank you.

To Fundy North, I guess to Maria because you spoke about offshore oil and gas exploration and mentioned the directional drilling rig. I'm somewhat familiar with it because I have a family member who works on the Hebron platform that just went out off the coast of Newfoundland. I was surprised to hear when they put the rig in place that it's stationary. That's where it stays, but they can do directional drilling to the extent that whatever direction they're going in, if they hit something like solid bedrock or something they can't go through, they can actually go around it and then continue on the same path.

With the depths they're doing that drilling at—and you were saying you'd be worried about that happening in an MPA—what would be the ill effects of that happening 100, 200, or 300 metres below the ocean floor to something that is being protected above?

[Maria Recchia]

I'm definitely not an expert in this realm at all, but I believe we're not clear on what could happen. I've heard things about cracks and gases being released and that sort of thing. Yes, maybe it's 200 metres down, but if we don't really know what the potential impacts are.... If you're talking about an MPA where you've removed a good chunk of the fishing in that area, so people have lost their ability to fish there, yet you're allowing oil and gas extraction underneath, it could have all kinds of unknown effects on wildlife. It doesn't seem appropriate to me.

[Ken McDonald, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

I don't recall anyone from the oil and gas industry presenting to us yet on Bill C-55 to enable us to ask them what happens when they're doing that directional drilling. I know it takes place, and I know they have the capability to do it, but I don't know.... As well, I know we've had people—I've met with them—from, say, Nalcor Energy in Newfoundland. They did a lot of seismic work and whatnot to figure out where there may be oil and gas off our shores. They've said that one of the ways they find it is that oil actually comes to the surface of the salt water, so there are natural cracks and escapes, whether they be gases leaking naturally over the years or small amounts of oil coming to the surface.

Like you, I don't know what that directional drilling would do or what it would cause to open up, but I can see how it would be a concern.

With regard to fisheries, I know you mentioned the scallop fishery, which I guess is bottom dragging—

Am I done?

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Pretty much. Do you want to continue very quickly and I'll let them respond?

[Ken McDonald, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

If an MPA area is trying to protect something, most of the protection, I would think, is on the bottom of the ocean, whether it's a sponge, or habitats, or whatever. For the scallop fishery it would be dragging-related: to fish it, you drag, and it would be devastating to what you're trying to protect.

How do you see the government bringing in that MPA and protecting this area, given how the scallop fishery is being affected? How do you see being able to make it work for the fishermen? Do we give them something else to fish or...?

[Maria Recchia]

It's a difficult question. In our area, the place they want to protect is because of what's growing on the bottom, but it's also a very active scallop fishing area. The reason there's all this beautiful biodiversity on the bottom is that there are a lot of pockets of places where they can't drag because of the topography.

Something we've been asking for is a limitation to the kinds of gear that could be used, so that no new gear would be allowed to be used in the scallop fishery that would allow them to go into those areas. In fact, a new gear is out right now. We've asked DFO to ban that gear and they haven't yet. The reason we want it banned is that we don't want to go into these areas, because they're also a refuge for scallops. They allow the scallops to reproduce and seed the other areas.

It's fairly complicated, and there's talk of closing down both areas where we fish and those where we don't fish. There really isn't any new bottom that can be opened up to us, I don't think, because we're scallop dragging everywhere we can in the Bay of Fundy, where it's physically possible.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Thank you, Ms. Recchia. We appreciate that.

Actually, Mr. McDonald pointed something out that I encourage all members to do, and that is, when we have people by video conference, please address the question to someone directly by saying their name and then the question. It makes it easier for those coming in by video conference. Thank you, Mr. McDonald.

I neglected to welcome Mr. Ted Falk, by the way. Mr. Falk is from the riding of Provencher.

Thank you for joining us, sir. You're in the next round.

Mr. Arnold, you have seven minutes, please.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to our guests this morning.

It's been an interesting process. The MPA study that we started early this year through a motion that I put forward to the committee has evolved now into studying Bill C-55, which is very much interrelated.

Mr. Smith, you talked about some of the current process. We're aware that the current process to establish an MPA is anywhere from five to seven to 10 years.

Would you comment, has that process produced efficient and effective MPAs? I will ask the others on the video conference as well.

[Tom Smith]

I think the process itself should be able to produce efficient and effective MPAs. I think that our concern, and again I speak for Nova Scotia, is that the collaboration has not been there to date. From our industry perspective, we've had two presentations directly on the idea of MPAs and this is going back six, seven, or eight months ago, but as information has started to get into the public domain, that's where we have identified a problem. Some of the information that has been released about specific parts of MPAs in Nova Scotia, what are being considered, and the products that are going to be compatible with those MPAs has not been clear.

For us, as I stated in my presentation, MPAs are going to be a very important part of the Nova Scotia landscape. We believe the collaboration among all the partners is important so that all the different ideas and all the different opportunities are explored.

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

Thank you to both our guests on the video conference. Can you comment on whether the former process has been effective and efficient or created effective and efficient MPAs?

[Maria Recchia]

Yes. We have an experience with one MPA in the Bay of Fundy, Musquash, and Fundy North Fishermen's Association, along with an environmental group proposed the establishment of this MPA. It took 10 years to be fully established. It did involve some protected land on the provincial side as well, so that was part of the holdup, but we were very happy with that process.

There's one glitch with it. One very sustainable fishery, a dive fishery, is not allowed in there because it hadn't been conceived of when it was established. I understand that now MPA establishment is a bit more flexible and these kinds of low-impact activities are being allowed later on.

I think the big difference there was that Musquash was an area where we did fish but not as extensively as the MPAs they're looking at right now in our region, where literally they're picking the one spot that has the very highest level of fishing. DFO did a study on the number of days of fishing for the whole Bay of Fundy, and that area shows up red, which is the highest, so that's going to be a big challenge for us.

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

Okay. Thank you.

Mr. Smith, you mentioned in your comments just a few minutes ago that you had a couple of presentations. Would you consider those meetings as presentations or consultations on MPAs? Were you able to provide feedback?

[Tom Smith]

Those were early on in the MPA process, and I would consider those presentations.

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

Our guests on video conference, have you been involved in meetings on MPAs and would you consider them to have been presentations or consultations with two-sided conversation?

[Maria Recchia]

We've been involved in many meetings. I was at one yesterday with DFO on MPAs, and they've been more consultative than some other meetings we've had with DFO, which were definitely just presentations, but still not, I think.... They seem to be locking us into drawing lines on the map in our local area as to where we could live with an MPA. Because that area is so highly fished, we just can't do it and not really hurt people's livelihoods, so it's been a bit difficult, but I've been involved in so many MPA meetings with DFO over the last year and a half, I couldn't even count.

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

Thank you.

Ms. Recchia, you mentioned something that you'd just heard yesterday about a new potential area of interest. Could you, and then Mr. Smith, tell us how you learn about areas of interest or proposed MPAs? From what I'm gathering, it seems that there isn't a consistent way of everyone finding out at the same time. Am I correct in assuming that?

[Maria Recchia]

I can't speak for how they're engaging with the aquaculture industry.

As for the fishing industry, I'm on the fisheries round table for the Scotia-Fundy region and I'm also on the MPA working group for that, which is open to all members of the round table and that working group has a huge membership. As we've known for a long time, there has been a map of the ecologically and biologically significant areas. It had a huge number of areas, and yesterday they showed us the draft network plan, which pared it down to much fewer areas that they're considering. Our region is not an official area of interest yet, but we're told that it might be coming in the future.

I don't know why they wouldn't be engaging with the aquaculture industry as strongly as they are with the fishing industry.

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

Mr. Smith.

[Tom Smith]

In our presentations, and as I said before, they were presentations from seven and eight months ago, what alarmed us, to be perfectly candid, was a meeting held with fisheries communities in one of the areas of Nova Scotia no more than five or six weeks ago that was the first outreach of specific information about a specific proposed MPA and the specific products that might be either compatible to be fished or grown, or non-compatible to be fished or grown. That concerned us, but just in the last two days I've had two meetings with DFO on specifically that topic.

I've been very satisfied this week with the response to our concerns. As a matter of fact, in a meeting with the deputy minister just this week, the response to our concerns was, in my opinion, very adequate. We're very satisfied that they are going to take a look at the information that was provided, how it was provided, and do a review of that process. That's a positive development, but leading up to this presentation, we were concerned about the process. We were looking for more transparency and more candid conversation. We got that type of commitment this week.

[The Chair, Liberal, Scott Simms]

Thank you, Mr. Smith. I appreciate it.

Mr. Donnelly, you have seven minutes, please.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you, witnesses, for your testimony on Bill C-55.

Mr. Smith, can I start with you in asking if your association has a position on oil and gas in MPAs?

[Tom Smith]

No, we do not.

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

Okay.

As you know, I'm from the west coast. We have salmon aquaculture, as well as finfish and other aquaculture as well, but certainly the salmon or finfish aquaculture has been somewhat contentious in terms of issues with parasites and disease management common to farming practices. You mentioned world-leading regulatory management.