I think that with regard to the fisheries that have the potential to interact with right whales, many of those are commercial fisheries, whether or not they are fished by non-indigenous or indigenous fishers. I think that when you hear about fishers' knowledge, we are absolutely including those who are commercially and communally fishing crab and lobster and other species , and other fisheries that are undertaken and owned by first nations, but you can't pull that knowledge on the water apart, necessarily, from the knowledge of non-indigenous fishers.
I would say that one of the things we've actually supported recently.... I'm not sure if you've seen the film Last of the Right Whales. We supported that being translated into Mi'kmaq, because often these things get told but not in the communities where they need to be told, and those stories don't get shared.
We did a series of workshops—that were supposed to be in person, but ended up being online because of COVID—to talk to indigenous communities about species at risk and get their perspectives. The ones that came out as most important and the ones they had the most knowledge about were eels, elvers and salmon, but I think it is the knowledge system and the values that are really important, and also the idea that these species have been here forever and we have to think in seven generations.... I do not claim at all to speak for indigenous knowledge, and that indigenous knowledge is not mine, but I think it has to be, as you say, a part of the solution. I do think that at the round tables, indigenous organizations and fishers absolutely participate increasingly. I think that will increase as well.
As Kim said, where everything is iterative, whether it is fishers' knowledge, indigenous knowledge, management measures or science, we're constantly increasing the inputs and hopefully improving the outputs.
Hopefully I've answered your question, but I do think that it's sometimes hard to separate. If you're a crab fisher, you're still out there fishing crab regardless of who you are, so your experiences on the water are reasonably similar.