Thank you. I'm going first, but we are sharing the time.
Hello, and thank you for the opportunity to appear before this committee once again.
I am sharing the time with Martin Paish so we can provide information about B.C.'s public fishing industry, the effects of COVID-19 on the industry and a detailed perspective on DFO's Sport Fishing Advisory Board, SFAB, proposals, that should play—but have yet to play—an important role in reducing impacts of the pandemic.
The Sport Fishing Institute of BC is a non-profit industry association that represents the interests of 250,000 licensed tidal water anglers in B.C. and the hundreds of businesses that support them. According to the most recent provincial sector report, the public fishery and related businesses produce $1.1 billion in annual sales and create more than 9,000 jobs, resulting in a $398-million contribution to the province's GDP. The public fishery is the single largest economic driver of all B.C. fisheries, yet anglers harvest only 15% of the annual halibut catch, and, while it varies year to year, 25% of the annual salmon harvest.
To this day in 2020, the department has paid little attention to the B.C. sport fishing industry or done little to address its concerns. The industry and many small businesses and coastal communities that are affected by and depend on reliable access and opportunity for the public fishery, hard-hit by broad and restrictive chinook measures implemented in 2019, and now again in 2020, are additionally suffering due to the impacts of COVID-19. There's a desperate need for certainty and stability for business survival and to allow the possibility of contributions to the local and provincial economies. The combined effect of 2019 and 2020 chinook restrictions, and now the pandemic, is a devastating one-two punch that could be mitigated by more timely and decisive action by the department.
The DFO response to repeated requests that reliable opportunity be a durable and entrenched aspect of annual fishery plans has been minimal. The public fishing and related businesses require an ability to plan for an upcoming season. Part of that planning includes communicating expectations to clients and pre-season purchasing and preparation. Anticipated access and opportunity are essential components of public fishery business and for its participants.
Clients plan a visit and go fishing based on many factors. Expectation and opportunity are foremost. Service providers, guides and lodge operations market and promote their services beginning each fall prior to a regular season, which would ordinarily run from March until October. Small community tourism agencies will similarly promote various attractions, including access to the public fishery. Without a sense of opportunity and expectation, the ability to offer a predictable or reliable experience is significantly compromised, if not impossible. The pandemic has only exacerbated the limitations to promote business and plan.
It should also be noted the sector, recognizing the challenges and unprecedented effects of the pandemic on regular management activities of the department, has been actively considering ways to address catch-monitoring gaps created as a result. Utilizing guides, avid anglers, volunteer anglers participating in sampling projects and catch data collection, and making the SRIF-funded FishingBC app available as an interim data collection tool have been offered. Yet to date, incorporating all additional data sources to address pandemic-caused gaps and to allow for increased understanding of catch and collection of data has not occurred.
The public fishery is dependent on a reliable and predictable opportunity, particularly now during the pandemic. While the department could have responsibly and defensibly implemented relevant aspects of the SFAB proposals in April, we continue to wait. As COVID restrictions relax, British Columbians and other Canadians can now begin to contemplate fishing-related travel and tourism activities that could provide important relief and support to many small communities and businesses. Lacking certainty will negatively affect those plans. Without access and opportunity that the SFAB proposals can deliver now and in the future, the damage to coastal communities, businesses and misperception continue to build and may be irreparable.
Now over to my colleague, Martin Paish, for specific details about the SFAB proposals and their development.