We were dismayed to learn that the DFO salmon team openly stated they would not discuss any proposals from the SFAB related to chinook retention in April and May of 2022.
It is a responsibility for DFO to work toward providing Canadian anglers sustainable fishing opportunities when they become available. Signing the 2010 recreational vision statement, DFO signalled its intent to work with the sport fishing advisory board in developing fisheries for the Canadian public. This apparently is not happening in the Pacific region.
Prime Minister Trudeau's mandate letter to the fisheries minister states that the minister should: “Work to support sustainable, stable, prosperous fisheries through the continued implementation of the modernized Fisheries Act”, and as well “Advance consistent, sustainable and collaborative fisheries arrangements with Indigenous and non-Indigenous fish harvesters.”
It seems there are once again biased personnel within the DFO Pacific region's senior fisheries management staff who continue to block public chinook fishing opportunities for no valid reason. The stated rationale for these decisions is often contentious. For that reason, we fear fisheries decisions are being manipulated by the Pacific region based on politics and not science.
When the Public Fishery Alliance learned DFO would not consider the amended chinook retention proposals in 2022, several PFA members approached local Liberal members of Parliament as a way of seeking help with this important issue. Subsequently, a meeting was arranged with senior policy adviser Neil Macisaac, who suggested two parts of the SFAB suite of the chinook retention proposals were potentially acceptable and nearly approved in 2021.
Among others, Patrick Weiler, Liberal MP from the West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country riding, was supportive of those proposals. It seems senior DFO Pacific region staff persuaded Minister Murray to reject them as well, and this time on the grounds of policy, not merit, citing they would not reopen the 2021-22 salmon integrated management plan. The reason for the denial of critically important, data-supported fishing opportunities makes no sense.
As a consequence of the crushing south coast management actions in place since 2019, and the loss of the April and May 2022 fishing opportunities, the PFA has lost all confidence in senior Pacific region leadership.
The second issue I raise with you today is the failure of DFO to mark all hatchery chinook in the Pacific region. Right now, only 10% of chinook are marked. The public pays for the production of hatchery fish, yet because these fish are largely unmarked, the public is denied access to them. The public deserves access to the fish they are paying to produce. DFO spent over $1 million purchasing marking trailers. With these marking trailers, up to 60,000 coho or chinook can be marked per day, compared with doing just 10,000 manually.
By marking all hatchery chinook it would allow for selective harvest of chinook by first nations, recreational fishers and commercial fishers who could identify and release wild chinook and harvest hatchery chinook. This would allow for much-needed data to be collected with the heads of these salmon that were turned in through the salmon head recovery program.
Failure to mark hatchery chinook will significantly reduce or prevent selective fisheries and be detrimental to wild stock. Even hatchery managers will be unable to tell the difference between wild and hatchery chinook during brood capture. What would be the incentive to use selective fishing techniques if sport, first nation and commercial cannot tell the difference between hatchery and wild fish?
The Fraser and Skeena rivers are being severely impacted by non-selective fishing by gillnet fisheries, where nets are used to catch all types of salmon and steelhead, leading to mortalities of these stocks of concern. The government must move to remove gillnets and use selective fishing technologies, such as fish traps, which can be used to catch salmon without injuring or killing the ones you want to release.
We have seen the near extinction of Chilcotin and Thompson steelhead because of gillnets, and are witnessing the same impacts on the Skeena River. There needs to be urgent action to save these populations, remove gillnets and address the pinnipeds that feed on out-migrating smolts and returning adults. The British Columbia—