Fisheries Committee on Feb. 27th, 2024

[Adam Burns]

The fleet shares would not change. The TAC is the total allowable catch, which is the quantum of fish that can come out of the water. The fleet shares are how that quantum is divided among the different interests in the fishery.

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

It's back to my initial question.

Why was the TAC set so low? Was that to allow the minister leeway to potentially appease those who didn't feel they were receiving enough TAC?

[Adam Burns]

The minister hasn't set the TAC yet.

She indicated that the minimum would be 25,000. She directed the department to undertake further consultation with industry, including the processing sector, in order to inform a final TAC, which will be established following next week's consultations.

One of the concerns the minister expressed is processing capacity, which links to market development. It's the importance of ensuring fish isn't just coming out of the water and not generating economic benefit. We'll be working with the fishing industry, including the processing sector, next week to help inform the minister's final decision on an appropriate level of removals for this year.

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

I want to go back to other questions.

You were questioned about what the minimum harvest TAC for the sector or vessels would be. You couldn't even provide a range for that. Yet, you're able to provide a range of anywhere from 85,000 to 310,000 metric tons as a TAC. You can't provide a range for a vessel that makes it viable for them to gear up, hire crew and go out.

[Adam Burns]

The department isn't privy to the specific operating costs of a particular vessel. That's commercially confidential information that isn't shared with the department. We are also not privy—

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

Is nothing done in the economic department within DFO to determine any of that information?

[Adam Burns]

We have general data that would inform at a fleet level what different cost structures might be. In the case of the redfish fishery though, because the market is underdeveloped and what the overall value of the removal of the processed product, if it was processed further, would be is still unknown, it's very difficult for us to identify a specific quantum that would lead to viability for a specific fleet.

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

With the millions and billions that this department receives in the budget and the estimates transfers, I'm shocked that they cannot even come up with some of these numbers.

I'll pass the rest of my time on to Mr. Perkins.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Mr. Perkins, go ahead.

[Rick Perkins, Conservative, South Shore—St. Margarets, NS]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'd like to follow up on MP Arnold's question. I'm curious. Why, when the lower end was 85 or 88 kilotons and the upper end by science was 312, did the minister's press release not say there would be at least 85 or 88 kilotons as opposed to the arbitrary number of 25 that was picked. To me, that seems very arbitrary and totally unrelated to science.

I can guarantee you that in Nova Scotia the plants are ready to go to process the fish, so that's not a barrier. There seems to be a massive disconnect. There is this minimum of 25, and it feels as though it's going to be like pulling teeth to get fisheries to go above that even when the science is saying to do something much larger.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Could you give us a quick answer, please?

[Dr. Bernard Vigneault]

Mr. Chair, I can speak to that question.

Basically the amount that science has arrived at is the potential removals in total for those three cohorts that we saw appearing, so it's not an annual TAC recommendation; and it's the maximum amount—

[Rick Perkins, Conservative, South Shore—St. Margarets, NS]

That's not what it says.

[Dr. Bernard Vigneault]

—of that biomass that could be removed so the stock would remain in the healthy zone. The different assumptions we're making with respect to natural mortality in part explain the two end numbers.

[Rick Perkins, Conservative, South Shore—St. Margarets, NS]

That's not what the DFO presentation says.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you, Mr. Perkins.

We'll now go to Mr. Morrissey for five minutes or less.

Go ahead, please, Mr. Morrissey.

[Bobby Morrissey, Liberal, Egmont, PE]

Thank you, Chair.

Mr. Burns, it's no surprise that the redfish fishery would be considered for reopening this year. It's been a discussion point for a couple of years that the redfish stocks had recovered to the point where a fishery would be open. Am I correct about that?

[Adam Burns]

That's correct. We've been working with the industry for a number of years on the potential reopening.

[Bobby Morrissey, Liberal, Egmont, PE]

It's the same with the industry. There was no big surprise here. Everybody was getting ready. I was getting lobbied about it, so the industry was certainly prepared on the processing side.

I believe you had an earlier answer about the shrimp starting to decline. When did your concern with the level of shrimp start?

[Dr. Bernard Vigneault]

The shrimp stock started declining in the mid-2000s.

[Bobby Morrissey, Liberal, Egmont, PE]

When exactly was that in the mid-2000s? Do you have a clear answer?

[Dr. Bernard Vigneault]

I don't have the graph, but it was in the mid-2000. Years before that we started to see the three cohorts of redfish appearing, so even at the time when the biomass of redfish was critically low, we started to see a decrease in our indices for the biomass of shrimp in the gulf, which speaks to broader environmental factors and not just to the predation by redfish as a contributing factor in their decline.

[Bobby Morrissey, Liberal, Egmont, PE]

Okay, so successive ministers were aware that there were some issues with the shrimp.

[Dr. Bernard Vigneault]

Yes, and actually an example of the application of the ecosystem approach that we alluded to earlier was that, with the changing conditions in the gulf, there was a realization that our framework to assess was not valid, so we have reviewed the assessment framework to specifically take into account those environmental changes.

[Bobby Morrissey, Liberal, Egmont, PE]

Okay.

Mr. Cormier, go ahead.