Fisheries Committee on June 2nd, 2022

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

I call today's meeting to order.

Welcome to meeting number 25 of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans.

Pursuant to Standing Order 108(2) and the motion adopted on February 1, 2022, the committee is resuming its study of science at the Department of Fisheries and Oceans.

This meeting of course is taking place in a hybrid format pursuant to the House order of November 25, 2021.

As per the directives of the Board of Internal Economy on March 10, 2022, all those attending the meeting in person must wear a mask, except for members who are at their place during proceedings.

For those participating by video conference, when you are ready to speak, click on the icon to activate your mike. Please speak slowly and clearly. When you are not speaking, your mike should be on mute. For interpretation, you have the choice at the bottom of your screen of either floor, English or French audio.

I'll remind everyone that all comments should be addressed through the chair.

I will let everyone know that right now we have two witnesses from Bait Masters Incorporated who haven't been able to join because they have a power outage. If it gets remedied or if they get to a spot where they can, they will join along the way.

We have, from the BC Seafood Alliance, Christina Burridge, executive director; from the Fish, Food and Allied Workers—Unifor, Keith Sullivan, president; from the Lower Fraser Fisheries Alliance, Aidan Fisher, biologist; from the Prince Edward Island Fishermen's Association, Melanie Giffin, marine biologist and program planner; and from the Regroupement des pêcheurs professionnels du sud de la Gaspésie, Jean Côté, scientific director.

We'll begin with opening remarks from Christina Burridge for five minutes or less, please.

[Christina Burridge, Executive Director, BC Seafood Alliance]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

The BC Seafood Alliance is an umbrella organization whose 30 members represent fisheries accounting for about 90% of the value of wild seafood from Canada's Pacific coast.

This study is one of the most important the committee has undertaken, and I want to give you my perspective on what works and what does not.

First, the CSAS process can and should be improved, but it provides a critical peer-review process for science advice to fisheries management. It incorporates new knowledge, data and updated stock assessment analyses consistent with the precautionary approach and accepted principles and standards of fisheries sustainability.

Second, DFO science in support of fish harvest management has long been starved of resources.

Third, when ministers ignore the science in favour of their own views, we are on dangerous ground.

The current process for peer-reviewed science advice is fundamental. It starts with a request for science advice, usually from fish management. CSAS identifies the lead scientists who will develop a response and pull together available data and research. A working group then assists the lead scientists in their review of the data, the validity of assumptions, and the development of assessment models. A draft research paper or assessment is produced for peer review by DFO scientists, academics, professional fisheries analysts and other interested parties. Independent peer review is provided by three expert reviewers, two external to DFO. Revisions may be recommended and provided for further review. The advice is then provided as a science advisory report to fisheries management, where it will be considered, along with social, cultural, economic and operational information, in the development of sustainable harvest advice.

The CSAS process provides a sound foundation, but would benefit from improvements to standardized procedures and the provision of formal reviewers. Other international jurisdictions compensate external reviewers so they can reliably obtain the services of subject matter experts, who are key to the integrity of the system. You get what you pay for. In our experience, qualified industry experts have an essential role to play. Not for someone like me, but our members and professional analysts bring an understanding of fisheries and survey data, assessment methodologies, evaluation, and the management context that scientists may not have. My members believe that good science is critical for fisheries sustainability and, therefore, invest in fisheries science and monitoring to the tune of almost $10 million annually. That's for groundfish and shellfish alone. Independent peer review of fisheries science, in support of management via CSAS, needs shoring up and strengthening, not tearing down.

Generally, resources for fisheries science have not grown with the demand for harvest advice. The Species at Risk Act, the sustainable fisheries framework, the fish stock provisions, and external demands for recognition of sustainability and good management—such as marine stewardship certification—put a huge burden on a very small number of highly qualified personnel on this coast. For example, our groundfish fishery has fully integrated over more than 60 different stocks, some of which have never had a stock assessment. Others have not had one for more than 30 years.

DFO has the resources to do only about two domestic west coast groundfish assessments a year, even when supported by professional analysts. In the absence of timely stock assessments, TACs may be more precautionary than necessary, meaning benefits to Canadians are constrained.

Lastly, I must mention the minister's December 2021 decision on Pacific herring, including cutting the TAC for Strait of Georgia herring in half. Pacific herring stocks have excellent long-term datasets and a thoroughly reviewed assessment and management approach. Herring stocks are surveyed and assessed annually, and there are no other valid estimates of their status. In particular, the Strait of Georgia herring population is estimated to be in the healthy zone, and has been above the limit reference point for decades. A harvest control rule is in place, which will reduce catches and cease commercial activity before the stock declines to a critical level. An arbitrary 50% cut by the minister ignores this information and discredits the work of DFO science and the CSAS process.

I hope the committee's recommendations will include providing resources to reinforce stock assessment, ensuring scientific peer review by an improved CSAS, improving effective monitoring and enforcement, and reducing political interference. These changes are important to fisheries on the west coast.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you, Ms. Burridge.

We'll now go to Mr. Sullivan for five minutes or less, please.

[Keith Sullivan, President, Fish, Food and Allied Workers - Unifor]

On behalf of 13,000 members from Newfoundland and Labrador, thanks for the opportunity.

The FFAW represents inshore harvesters in our province, encompassing 10,000 owner-operators and crew. Our scope of membership also includes hundreds of workers in fish processing.

I am here today to explain the essential role fish harvesters play in sustainable fisheries management and the concerning way their knowledge and expertise have been excluded from science and management.

In Newfoundland and Labrador, the value of the inshore fishery cannot be overstated. It is not an industry that can simply be replaced through theoretical green jobs or tech industry development, nor does it need to be. It requires support and investment. It is an industry that can be sustainably maintained for generations to come through sound scientific advice, diversification and putting people and communities first when making decisions.

Ensuring that the fishery remains vibrant into the future is a pillar of the work our union undertakes. A critical component of that is ensuring that harvesters' knowledge and voices are heard and valued by DFO, in particular. In the three decades since the devastation of the cod moratorium, our organization has been a trailblazer for improving marine science by initiating dozens of surveys and other scientific projects, bringing quantifiable information from harvesters to the scientific assessment table.

The demand for robust science has expanded in recent years. Our union has invested greatly in building a competent science team with full-time scientists and other staff. We know that much of the science has filled gaps left by the federal government. Each year, over 1,000 individuals volunteer their time and knowledge, making meaningful contributions to science.

Despite all of this, harvesters still do not have a valued seat at the table, and DFO continues to disregard harvesters and their contributions.

The blue economy must begin with independent harvesters, who are most impacted by the changes in our marine environment. These Canadians and their families have the most to lose. The decisions relating to science and the management of fisheries and oceans have very real impacts on their lives, yet they are usually the last to be considered.

Fewer invitations for harvester participation during the science and management process, less support from DFO and a broad sentiment of disrespect toward harvesters and the fishing industry have brought me here today. By ignoring the valuable observations of harvesters and by refusing to conduct adequate scientific assessments, the government is eroding the inshore fishery in our province. There is concern from harvesters that their voices are being replaced by influential special interest groups that lobby, and that the impact of those groups on government decisions is hurting our communities, our economy and our ability to work toward healthy communities.

Recent changes to the Fisheries Act have prioritized the sustainable fisheries framework, including the precautionary approach. While this is very well-intentioned, it forces rigid frameworks on fisheries that are not supported by adequate science.

Oftentimes, the precautionary approach attempts to rebuild fisheries to the highest point in a time series for that species. The result is several independent approaches attempting to build all species back to historic highs. This may be impossible for an ecosystem.

One issue that has been ignored for decades is the impact seal populations are having on fish stocks. Species like capelin and cod, which are often scrutinized by conservation groups, have low harvest rates. We see that DFO in 2008 said that harp seals ate 4.2 million tonnes of prey. To put this into perspective, the fishery in Atlantic Canada probably takes 560,000 tonnes in a year. It feeds millions of people and has generated more than $3 billion.

Recently, the minister made a decision on gulf shrimp that completely deviated from the PA, making more aggressive cuts to the resource. This PA was developed in consultation with fish harvesters, scientists and management, yet the decision discarded this work.

I ask you, when decisions like this are repeatedly made, how can harvesters trust DFO?

I'm here to ask you to consider the following recommendations.

We ask that you immediately consider recommendations to increase independent inshore fish harvesters' contributions to the scientific and management processes for all fisheries, such as through CSAS or the advisory process.

As science gets more complex, the Fisheries Act dictates that it will become more rigid, unless meaningful measures are taken to ensure fish harvester knowledge is given weight. We ask the federal government to undertake an initiative to ensure that fish harvester knowledge be incorporated in all science and management decisions. Both natural and socio-economic sciences are critical components of fishery sustainability and should be treated with equal weight.

Finally, we ask the Government of Canada to explicitly state that the independent inshore harvesters and those who live in and depend upon the marine environment adjacent to them will be prioritized in the blue economy strategy.

Thank you for the time.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you, Mr. Sullivan.

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

[Aidan Fisher, Biologist, Lower Fraser Fisheries Alliance]

Éy latelh. Good morning. My name is Aidan Fisher. I'm a band member of Tzeachten First Nation in Chilliwack, B.C., which is part of the Stó:lo Nation. I'm speaking to all of you who are meeting on the unceded traditional territory of the Algonquin Anishinabe people from the unceded S'ólh Téméxw territory of the Stó:lo people.

I'm here today through my day job as a fisheries biologist for the Lower Fraser Fisheries Alliance, an indigenous technical organization that works to support the collective interests of 23 first nations along the lower Fraser River for fish, fisheries and fish habitat that have supported our people since time immemorial.

Over the past seven years, I have participated in numerous DFO Canadian Science Advisory Secretariat review processes at multiple levels. I have also worked with many DFO staff members in different departments on science and technical items related to the Fraser salmon, eulachon and sturgeon fisheries.

My colleagues and I are frequently frustrated by the inconsistency and lack of transparency with which we see scientific information being applied to support management decisions at the decision-making tables. While some management actions benefit from extensive technical discussion with rights holders and stakeholders, other important decisions are presented with little or no technical justification. When organizations like ours request data and analysis from DFO staff to support and justify these decisions, we are often left waiting for long periods of time and, in some cases, do not receive any technical information at all.

Even throughout DFO's annual integrated fisheries management planning processes, in which actions are usually justified with some degree of technical information, the level of detail of that information varies greatly, depending on which species or fishery is under review.

The way in which areas of study are prioritized by DFO also lacks transparency. Economically important species seem to be prioritized over stocks for which there is greater conservation concern. Economically important species include typical commercial fisheries and recreational fisheries that support lucrative industries all along the coast. Stocks and species that contribute only to first nations fisheries are simply not prioritized for study, so there is usually insufficient or no support for scientific projects and investigation.

It's also important to note that resourcing is not provided for external participants like me to engage in CSAS peer-review processes. My participation on CSAS reviews takes time away from other projects and studies the LFFA is advocating for, and I do this only because the LFFA and its member nations consider peer-reviewed technical processes to be vitally important to understanding the management decision-making process.

Our people have a wealth of knowledge, passed down since time immemorial, for maintaining and supporting robust fish populations and fisheries. Indigenous knowledge and application stand distinct from and complementary to western science, yet they are routinely incorporated as a small part of the scientific peer-review process. If DFO and Canada are serious about reconciliation, a small step could be the development of a robust indigenous knowledge and application program on our terms. While some DFO processes, like COSEWIC and SARA, identify the inclusion of indigenous knowledge, it's included in a way that inherently contradicts the extent and capacity of the understanding. Indigenous knowledge is overwhelmingly not applied in the final recommendations, because the information doesn't fit within the western science framework. For example, it is labelled too complex, not specific enough, too specific, not relevant or not contained in a published source.

As first nations along the Fraser River grow their capacity to take on technical work, there is an increasing interest in collaboration with science and technical staff at DFO with the intention of moving into the complete transition of technical work to first nations. DFO operates extensive technical work throughout the lower Fraser, with highly variable levels of inclusion and respect for the authority of traditional territories and resources. DFO needs to develop a transition program for all work happening in the traditional territories of first nations that are interested in taking on fisheries work. DFO staff are not required to include first nations in their programs in our territories, let alone to transition their programs and facilities to interested first nations. This needs to change.

First nations are prepared to collaborate, but our ability to do so is highly dependent on the personality of the DFO staff person we are working with and basic, consistent resourcing for our teams. In some cases, the relationship is open and productive, while in others it's a challenge to receive basic information. What we see with other sectors is that DFO does seem to be consistently engaged, prepared to share data and happy to resource participation and collaborative projects. What we are looking for now is that same openness, transparency and collaborative spirit extended to first nations and our science and technical work.

Yalh yexw kw'as hoy. Thank you, committee members, for your time today.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you, Mr. Fisher.

We'll now go to Ms. Giffin for five minutes or less, please.

[Melanie Giffin, Marine Biologist and Program Planner, Prince Edward Island Fishermen's Association]

On behalf of the approximately 1,200 fishers in P.E.I., I would like to thank you, Mr. Chair and members of this committee, for the invitation to speak to you today.

The P.E.I. Fishermen's Association was created in the 1950s and has evolved alongside the Department of Fisheries and Oceans to create the well-established working relationship we currently maintain.

Since science is the topic today, I would first like to say that the PEIFA knows how hard DFO scientists work to ensure fulsome representation of the data collected. Our goal in being here today is to focus on the processes and mechanisms behind the collection of scientific data, and how they can evolve along with industry and the changing needs of DFO.

The quality of the data being collected and how it differs from species to species was brought up in previous sessions, so I will expand a little, but I will also include specific comments regarding process.

Number one, logbooks are an economically feasible way for DFO to collect a wealth of information. Unfortunately, it has become common practice for DFO to create these logbooks with no input from industry. If harvesters will be filling out the data, they should be involved in the discussion on how it is recorded to ensure consistency of the data collection. Otherwise, the data becomes unreliable and the logbooks a wasted resource.

Number two is field and at-sea data collection. This can take place by DFO directly or by industry for DFO. No matter which way this happens, DFO needs to ensure that funding is there to complete the work that would be considered “A-based” data collection in DFO's eyes. That is data required to complete the appropriate stock assessment for that species. This burden should not fall to industry to cover. DFO also needs to ensure that the process for industry to help is streamlined. Both the procurement hub process and the process to apply for a scientific permit are flawed and could use improvements.

Number three is CSAS publications and stock assessments. Although it was noted previously that industry is always included in this process, that is not the case. The PEIFA is not always invited to the process, and when we request a seat at the table in a meeting, we have been denied even an observer's seat during that process in the past. The PEIFA feels that there is a lack of interest by DFO in hearing what harvesters have to say. In reality, it is the harvesters who see the change first, long before DFO scientists ever do. Ideally, DFO should be looking for a way to capture this industry perspective and use it to shape their data collection moving forward.

Stock assessments are moving toward a model approach with less industry input. This is not ideal, but if this is the road stock assessments will take, it would be ideal to include industry in DFO training on incorporation of models into stock assessments to ensure meaningful contributions by industry.

Number four is trust and transparency. Advisory committees were set up by DFO so industry could be heard, but to industry, most of these advisory meetings now appear to be a checkmark for DFO to say they have consulted with industry rather than taking part in meaningful engagement and collaboration. The PEIFA has approximately 22 committees with over 200 volunteer fishers who put significant time and effort into in-house meetings in preparation for these DFO advisory committee meetings. The PEIFA does this with the understanding that its recommendations on science and management will be passed along to the minister. There is no transparency around the information that is passed to the minister and what input, if any, is being considered by DFO.

Number five is process. Through all the avenues to gather industry feedback and data—CSAS, advisory minutes, meetings, procurement—DFO does not create an atmosphere that is inclusive with respect to participation in science. In some cases, industry does not receive documentation until the day of the meeting. In other cases, packages are not released from their procurement hub until two weeks prior to a deadline. Sometimes field sampling starts much later than planned with no back-up plan from DFO. There are many examples of DFO timelines or processes being a hindrance to data collection with no room for industry input into the data collection, efficiency of collection or discussions on real costs associated with the data collection.

Again, the PEIFA wants to reiterate that we believe it is the DFO process that is hindering proper data collection, proper data sharing and proper science consultation.

Thank you for your time.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you, Ms. Giffin.

We'll now go to Mr. Côté for five minutes or less, please.

[Jean Côté, Scientific Director, Regroupement des pêcheurs professionnels du sud de la Gaspésie]

Good morning, Mr. Chair.

The 146 skipper/owners, three local indigenous nations and I all thank you for your time.

I have a bachelor’s and master’s degree in marine biology from Laval University. My professional career started in Gaspésie while working for a pioneering sea farming company in Quebec. I later joined a university team as a research assistant. Then I spent 16 years as a scientific director for a sea farming company. Since 2010, I have worked for the Regroupement des pêcheurs professionnels du Sud de la Gaspésie, or RPPSG, as a scientific director.

The RPPSG and I are also members of the Lobster Group, better known as the Lobster Node, a group of fishers’ associations from the five Atlantic provinces. Government researchers from DFO, a provincial ministry, as well as university researchers also take part in this group. Through collaborative research, it conducts studies and fills the gaps in our knowledge about the productivity, structure and connectivity of lobster stocks in their distribution area.

Our association is known for designing and implementing measures that conserve lobster stocks and reduce fishing effort, in order to preserve the resource for all lobster fishers in the Gaspé, both indigenous and non-indigenous, all of whom depend on this resource for their livelihoods and the livelihood of their communities.

In this context, for over 10 years, I have conducted surveys and analyses of lobster stocks in the Gaspé. Data collection during the commercial fishing season takes place in lobster fishing areas 19, 20A and 20B, but not yet in area 21. Fishers who participate in data collection use modified fishing traps to obtain a complete sampling of the stock structure in the fishing areas under study. The data is then provided to scientists at the Maurice Lamontagne Institute here at DFO in Quebec City.

After the fishing season, following a rigorous protocol in place since 2011, I collect similar data to analyze the remaining stocks in Lobster Fishing Area 20. This data is compiled and then forwarded to DFO. I do a summary analysis myself and present it to my fishers. The RPPSG fully funds this monitoring. We applied for funding from the Fonds des pêches du Québec, but it was denied on the grounds that this was a follow-up, not a project.

Since 2021, in partnership with the Centre de développement et de recherche en intelligence numérique, CDRIN, we designed a novel artificial intelligence model. We used post-season data collected over the last 10 years to predict the evolution of stocks and catches.

Furthermore, as part of the MSC certification of the spring commercial fishery, and to better answer certification assessors’ questions, I conduct an annual analysis of fishing bait and bycatch data in Lobster Fishing Areas 19, 20 and 21. With the agreement of our fishers, we use the data from JOBEL, an electronic logbook developed by the RPPSG and used since 2015.

Unfortunately, over the past 10 years, I have not had the opportunity to move towards further collaboration with DFO on data analysis and scientific work done by the RPPSG. Certainly, as an expert, I attend the regional peer review of the Quebec inshore lobster assessment, which normally takes place every three years. The last meeting was in March 2019. The next one, which was supposed to take place in February 2022, was postponed. However, lobster is a key species from a socio-economic point of view for Quebec and the Gaspé. Its distribution is changing, as is the stock. For this reason, it seems essential to me to conduct a review of the biological basis for assessing the lobster stock’s healthy zone. This would provide a more realistic vision of the state of the stocks and fishing pressure.

This is especially important for Lobster Fishing Area 21, on which very little data exists. The last stock assessment in 2018 was based on partial data for the area. DFO advice, dated February 11, 2020, was presented at the lobster workshop. It indicated that in the context of environmental change, inducing a new source of variability is undesirable. DFO’s changes to management measures in 2019 are inconsistent with conservation objectives intended to avoid increased fishing pressure.

In September 2021, despite this advice, the lack of data for fishing area 21 and RPPSG's concerns about the impact on a fishery's fall stocks, DFO modified the lobster fisheries management plan for fishing area 21 by introducing a second commercial fishing season, ostensibly to collect data. Despite repeated requests from RPPSG, we haven't received any information regarding the protocol planned by DFO nor have we obtained the results of the study. Therefore, we're wondering if this data is considered confidential under the Fisheries Act because it would have been collected with the help of an indigenous band. We think there is a lack of information sharing between the department and the associations, which are very involved in the research, particularly the lobster research, in our case.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

Thank you, Mr. Côté.

Before I move to questions, I have a reminder to members that we have to go in camera for about the last half hour of the committee this morning, to discuss some committee business.

I remind members that we have our witnesses on Zoom. Please identify who your question is for, so we don't have five people just gazing at the screen wondering who should answer.

For the witnesses, if somebody is answering a question and you have a comment you want to add, if you use the “raise hand” function, I'm sure the member will recognize you and have you participate in that.

As we move to questions, we'll go to Mr. Perkins to start off, for six minutes or less, please.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you, witnesses. Those were very interesting presentations during this important study we are doing. It's been very enlightening.

My first question is for Mr. Sullivan.

On February 17, FFAW-Unifor issued a news release that said:

At the Canadian Independent Fish Harvesters Federation annual meeting, Minister Murray put forward her ideas and vision for the fishery on the east coast of Canada and stated clearly that her goal is to leave as many fish in the water as possible and to grow as much vegetation in the water as possible so that the Atlantic Ocean can better absorb carbon to combat climate change.

The release went on to say:

The Minister also stated that fish harvesters will have to accept this sacrifice as part of Canada’s commitment to fight climate change, noting that given technological advancements, harvesters could change career paths and work remotely from their communities.

I'm not sure that statement was based on the quality of the science she was receiving from the department, so I asked the minister about that news release in the House in question period in March.

Her response was, “I have been misquoted at times”. Again this week in the committee of the whole, I gave her a chance to correct herself and to say whether or not she was misquoted. She said, “I think that is a complete misconstrual of what I said.”

This is my opening question, Mr. Sullivan. Is that a misconstrual? It reminds me of a Groucho Marx quote: “Quote me as saying I was misquoted.” It's always sort of an excuse in a private meeting afterwards to say you were misquoted.

Did the minister say that?

[Keith Sullivan]

I guess first of all, I don't think it was misconstrued. We'd heard similar things before and were quite concerned. Our colleagues on the west coast, as Ms. Burridge mentioned, were highly concerned about a decision we had seen on herring. Our members were very concerned about some of the messages we were seeing, and we just wanted to raise our concerns.

We hope that the minister has reconsidered her position. We've certainly had a lot of discussions and there have been a number of decisions since then.

At the time, our members were really concerned about the messages we'd been hearing from the minister at that time.

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

Thank you, Mr. Sullivan.

Ms. Burridge, you made a comment about the Pacific herring decision and the science that the stocks are healthy, but it was cut by 50%. Your concern obviously was that science wasn't used in that decision-making process.

I know that when groups asked the minister's office why that decision was made, the minister's office said that it wasn't based on science; it was based on a holistic approach to the ocean, which is, of course, not something I quite fathom in terms of a definition.

Could you please comment on the decision to call adult herring a forage fish for salmon and use that as reason to cut it without science?

[Christina Burridge]

As I mentioned, Pacific herring has one of the very best datasets, going back decades on this coast. It's also recently been through a management strategy evaluation, which allows the science people at DFO to evaluate the effect of different harvest-control rules. The harvest-control rule that we've long had in place, going back some 30 years, of essentially a 20% harvest rate, has been shown through modelling to be not significantly different in terms of the biological outcomes from the 10%, say, that the minister chose.

The effect of that decision was to take $15 million or $20 million out of the fishery, without in our view putting any more fish for salmon, especially as the predator-prey relationship between salmon and herring is really quite complicated because on the whole salmon don't eat adult herring. Sometimes they do. However, herring do eat juvenile salmon, so we can actually see, going back over time, that as herring populations in the Strait of Georgia have increased, Chinook salmon populations have gone down. It's much more complicated than the minister suggested.

For me, the worrying thing is that the science, with all these years of hard work and peer reviews, was ignored. I think that sends the wrong message to fish harvesters, because basically we're prepared on this coast to live and die by the science. If the science says we can fish, we should. If it says we can't, we won't.

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

Thank you.

Ms. Giffin, you mentioned the role of harvesters in developing policy, science, knowing what's going on. Often at this committee we've heard witnesses suggest that harvesters and their associations shouldn't be involved in those decision-making processes. We also hear that first nations knowledge should be. To me, both of them are valid.

Could you comment on that, please?

[Melanie Giffin]

Yes. I think what it comes down to is understanding the contribution that industry can provide. As I noted in my opening remarks, the harvesters are going to see the changes on the water before DFO scientists ever do. The recommendation would be to make sure DFO is using that knowledge to shape the data, the science and the data that they collect, going forward.

I feel that harvesters have a right to be a part of that process, because there are situations, especially now, in which DFO says, “We're not seeing that,” but industry is, and that's being missed. There's a complete miscommunication there. With industry not a part of those meetings and not having a voice, that gets cut out completely.

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

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken McDonald]

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

[Serge Cormier, Liberal, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

My question will be for Mr. Sullivan.

Let's talk about shrimp for a minute. As you know, I have close to 15 shrimp fishermen here in the region who were impacted by the quota drop this year in the shrimp fisheries. Let's do some math here.

What do you think of those numbers that DFO gave when it comes to the number of shrimp that are eaten by the redfish? DFO said that it's more than 200,000 metric tonnes of shrimp that are eaten by redfish, and the quota this year dropped close to, I think, a little more than 15,000. What do you think of those numbers?

[Keith Sullivan]

As you say, it doesn't necessarily add up. One thing I think harvesters believe, and one of the things they've seen and have been legitimately concerned about, is these growing redfish and the impact they're going to have on the shrimp. That's why the people who are impacted really have to be the people who get access to the other adjacent resources there.

Similar to the point that we saw with herring on the west coast, we had an agreed-upon precautionary approach with harvest-control rules in that fishery. It was really only eight or nine years ago it was put in place. It was done with harvesters and with scientists and managers, and the cuts went even deeper than that. It deviated from that without the engagement of industry, which was really disappointing. I think it hurts the relationship with the department when we deviate from those things.

The shrimp harvesters, a couple of hundred in Newfoundland and Labrador, plus those working in the plants, were really hurt by that decision when things were tough already.

[Serge Cormier, Liberal, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

With those numbers, the goal of DFO is to actually make sure that we rebuild the stocks, right? With those numbers, though, if we keep on going year after year.... I think that last year it was 168,000. This year, the number is close to 218,000. Next year, it might go up again. What is the solution? We want to rebuild the stock, of course, but at the same time, those redfish are eating a ton of it. We already saw a drop in quota for next year.

What are you proposing? Those redfish will still eat the shrimp for sure, but at the same time we have to make sure that we try to rebuild the stock. The way I'm seeing it right now—and I'm not an expert—it will be very difficult to rebuild the stock if the redfish are eating it. I know we want to have a redfish fishery in the coming years, but as you know, we're not there yet.

What is your solution to, yes, helping rebuild the stock, but also, it's our communities, as you know, that are suffering from the cutting of quotas...? What is your solution?

[Keith Sullivan]

I would say first of all that in a situation like that, when we have an ecosystem and large predation like that, there are no easy solutions. I think we have to look at a couple of things. First, to cut harvesters is not the only solution to dealing with these issues. There could have been—and that's why I mentioned the social sciences—some additional consideration given to how we handle these situations, because a lot of people don't believe that there is any rebuilding of shrimp with that many redfish and that kind of a dynamic in the environment. That's one thing.

The other thing we talk about is giving consideration to those who are adjacent to the resource, the people who are impacted by redfish taking over the habitat that the shrimp have, and to not exclude them from that fishery, with people having access to several fisheries and different parts of the ecosystem. Having that diversification in terms of what's in adjacent waters is a plan that can really give some stability at times when we know the environment is really unpredictable. We have highs and lows that oftentimes are not caused by the harvesters themselves.

[Serge Cormier, Liberal, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

I have only one minute left.

You sent a letter to Minister Murray for some possible solutions that would very rapidly help those fishermen. I want to clarify something. It seems to be a little different when it comes to permit costs between your fishermen in Newfoundland and our fishermen here in New Brunswick. If I'm not mistaken, your licence fee is only $100 per fisherman, right?

[Keith Sullivan]

There are certainly significant individual quota fees on top of that, and some of the short-term solutions were some additional supports for people who have really been hit hard, yes.