Fisheries Committee on June 17th, 2020

[The Clerk of the Committee, Ms. Nancy Vohl]

Mr. Paish, I believe your language selected on your computer could be French.

[Martin Paish]

My language selected on the computer is English.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Mr. Blanchette-Joncas, thank you for that, but the witness has more than expired the time.

We'll move on now to our next witness.

Mr. Burke, when you're ready, you have six minutes or less, please.

[Osborne Burke, General Manager, Victoria Co-operative Fisheries Ltd.]

Thank you to the chair and the fellow members of the committee.

I am general manager of Victoria Co-operative Fisheries Ltd., located in northern Cape Breton. We're a fishermen's co-operative, 100% owned by the harvesters, and have been around since 1956. Our members harvest lobster, snow crab, groundfish on an annual basis. We, as others, have been significantly affected by COVID-19 issues, starting with our rush to acquire PPE equipment and the challenges with obtaining it, paying as high as six dollars Canadian for face masks from China, down to a dollar at the latter part of the month into April.

We look at some of the challenges we face or are currently facing. The new stabilization fund program was announced, similar to B.C.'s and others. With the program, I would say that for Nova Scotia, based on a proportional basis and $2.2 billion in exports, the amount of money available is certainly not going to do justice to us.

Secondly, under the stabilization fund, it's our understanding that in this federal program all the funds that we spent on disposable face masks are not eligible. Only reusable face shields, Lexan panels on equipment, and that type of equipment will be claimable. The $50,000 to $60,000 we spent in masks, going through two to three per day, is not eligible.

The CERB was extended, we understand today, for another eight weeks. We had an attrition rate of almost 40% with local workers—we believe a lot of it due to the CERB. Workers decided not to come to work, and we've even seen it in the past 24 hours since the announcement. That's provided a significant challenge to us.

We thank everybody in the government and all parties for putting these measures forward. The federal wage subsidy is extremely helpful. It's making a difference in a tough year. However, in meeting the 30%, you have a challenge in the fact that some companies want to ramp up, but they need the subsidy. If they ramp up too quickly, they're disqualified from the subsidy.

There was some reference by the Prime Minister to changing the percentage. I would recommend that it should be on some sort of a sliding scale. If you're at a 30% loss in revenue, maybe it's 75%. If it's 20% or something, you get a reduced percentage back. That would still be helpful, but we don't want to be a hindrance to companies ramping up and hiring more workers so we can get workers off the CERB and back into the workforce. That's a significant challenge.

Currently for our workers and the harvesters, the harvesters are averaging about a 40% reduction in revenues just based on the receiving price for their product. Just this past week with the issues in Beijing, and with the Chinese government looking at checking all shipments live or frozen into China, it's created challenges for us. For example, tomorrow 40,000 pounds of live lobsters to the U.S.A. are being cancelled. We had two shipments to China of frozen product cancelled because of the delays that are going to be faced. The Chinese government has to hold live product for 48 hours now to clear it from COVID-19, and there are similar additional checks on frozen products.

These are all challenges. It's clear that the biggest challenge we have right now, for everybody who sat in isolation or sat at home during COVID-19, is that we seriously need to improve Internet access all across Canada, in the rural communities. We're here on a phone and the Internet comes and goes like the wind. We have significant challenges with it. It's bad enough that I drive 20 kilometres and I have to stop at three locations. I can't use my cellphone because we don't have proper coverage. The Internet and Internet access is critical, more so than ever today than it was prior to this year.

We heard some comments earlier, as I listened in, on markets. Within Canada we're always trying to increase our markets and outside of Canada too, obviously in the U.S.A. and Asia.

We hope that things will open up to travel so we can get back to doing trade shows with our federal and provincial partners, where we get to meet our customers, which is critical. Whether we're selling in Canada, we're selling in Shanghai or we're selling in Hong Kong, it's critical to make those connections and those relationships. That's been severely limited due to the restrictions on travel. As I said, the Internet is more important than ever, but we just don't have proper access.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'll stop there.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

That's perfect, Mr. Burke. That was just about dead on the six-minute mark. I say thank you for that.

We'll now go to our round of questioning. Before I go to Mr. Fast, I will say to everybody, including the witnesses, please speak slowly and clearly and as much into the mike as you can so that we can get the proper interpretation for everybody who is part of this meeting.

Mr. Fast, when you're ready, you have six minutes or less, please.

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

Thank you very much.

Welcome to all of our witnesses. It's nice to hear you again, Fred, Owen and Martin. Thank you, Osborne, for your contribution as well.

I want to talk about the SFAB's proposals to the minister. I've reviewed them and, honestly, they seem eminently sensible. They talk about mass marking of current hatchery chinook production, implementation of mark-selective fisheries in this and future years, enhanced catch monitoring regimes and improved assessments. It goes on and on and on.

You indicated you still haven't had a response from the minister. Can you tell me when you handed in that proposal?

[Martin Paish]

We submitted that proposal on April 9. At that point in time, we urged the minister to ensure that a timely decision would be made. Here we are in the middle of June, and people are still waiting to be able to understand what their opportunity to fish for chinook might be in some of these hard-hit communities.

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

Thanks.

Now, your season starts, normally, when? Did you say April or May?

[Martin Paish]

The chinook season in British Columbia is 12 months long, but the peak of the tourist season and when people really get into going chinook fishing starts in April and continues through until the end of September.

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

Your proposal suggests that the rebuilding of stream-type chinook will result in the collapse of the recreational fishery infrastructure unless mark-selective fishery is more broadly applied. You agree with that assessment, right?

[Martin Paish]

I do agree with that assessment. I believe that recovery of stream-type Fraser chinook will require a multifaceted, comprehensive type of program that is likely to take decades. The only way the public fishery is going to be able to survive and realize its potential will be through a wider scale implementation of mark-selective fisheries in southern B.C.

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

You probably know that Minister Jordan was here at committee last week. I asked her about mark-selective fishing and mass marking of hatchery salmon. Honestly, she seemed to confuse genetic integrity and mass marking.

Can you tell me, first of all, how many hatchery chinook salmon are released every year?

[Martin Paish]

In British Columbia we release approximately 40 million chinook salmon. I'm not sure of the entire amount if you include coho, but it is 40 million chinook. Of those, approximately 10% or less are marked.

The State of Washington releases around 150,000 chinook a year. All of those or the bulk of those end up spending a good portion of their lives in British Columbia waters. It marks 100% of its chinook.

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

Just for clarity, of these hatchery salmon that are already in the wild, only 10% are being marked. If we mark the other 90%, that doesn't impose any increased genetic challenge to our wild salmon, does it?

[Martin Paish]

The answer to your question is yes. The reality is that mass marking of hatchery-produced salmon actually helps with the genetic integrity. We can identify hatchery salmon. We can remove them from systems before they spawn. We can carefully select brood stock or progeny for hatcheries to ensure that we don't create domesticated fish by breeding hatchery salmon with hatchery salmon.

So the answer is that mass marking should actually be able to help with genetic integrity, not hurt.

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

The minister suggested that there's lots of science still to be done; there are still questions about the genetic integrity of our wild salmon. I sense she was confused about the issue, because as you have said, mass marking of hatchery fish that are going to go out into the wild should not in any way affect additionally any genetic challenges that might exist. Is that correct?

[Martin Paish]

Yes. The reality is that the implementation of mass marking and mark-selective fisheries is something that for several years now the sport fishing advisory board has been asking for. There's been ample time to do the study that's required.

We are not asking for an increase in hatchery production. We're simply asking DFO to mark those fish that are currently produced in hatcheries for catch so that they can be identified and caught instead of anglers retaining wild chinook. It's pretty simple.

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

If you were to prioritize future investments in your recreational industry—these would be federal government investments beyond the mass marking of hatchery fish—what would those be?

[Martin Paish]

I would suggest that the Department of Fisheries and Oceans needs to invest in the human and structural resources within the department in the Pacific region that reflect the value of the public fishery. In other words, the Department of Fisheries and Oceans would be well suited, in my opinion, to creating a division for recreational fisheries so that the fishery has adequate staff and financial resources to be managed properly. That is not the case now.

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

Just getting back to mass marking, how much—

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you, Mr. Fast. Your six minutes are up. You're actually a bit overtime.

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

Oh, man, that went fast.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Yes. When you're having fun, the time goes fast.

We'll now go to Mr. Hardie for six minutes or less, please.

[Ken Hardie, Liberal, Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to some old friends—or at least one old friend.

How are you, Mr. Bird?

I want to get back to the COVID-19 issue. That's really the focus of these hearings. We've heard from various sectors over time that, yes, COVID-19 has had an impact, but they can't avoid bringing in some of the foundational or systemic issues in their sectors. We heard this from elderly people. We're hearing it from you. Yes, COVID has certainly amplified what's been going on, but the foundational issues pre-existed the pandemic, and they've been brought up even more sensitively now.

Mr. Paish, you mentioned that the primary time period, the most valuable time period, for sports fishing is April. But you'd have to agree that in April, Americans weren't coming across the border and Canadians weren't travelling very much, of course because of the lockdown. In this case, you missed the prime time simply because of the pandemic. Would that be your take on it?

[Martin Paish]

I think I would correct you on one thing there, Ken. I think what I said was that the season for chinook fishing begins in April and continues until the end of September, with the peak season really being the summer months of July and August. Your statement is essentially correct, though, in that there is no anticipation that the U.S. border is going to open in time for our season. People are running out of time to effectively plan their businesses and that type of thing.

We are still not in phase three in British Columbia yet, which encourages within-the-province travel. We're hoping that will come soon. That's why we're hoping that fisheries opportunities will be announced.

The other side of the equation, of course, is that—