Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thanks to the witnesses for being here to answer our questions. We are very grateful to them.
At the outset, I would like to say that about 25 years ago I went cod fishing on the St. Lawrence River with my father. All of a sudden, an announcement was made that sounded the death knell for the cod fishery: there was to be no more seal hunt. My father didn't miss a beat in telling me that seals were the primary predators of cod and that seals only ate the viscera. A few years later, my father told me cod was finished. He told me he was not going to see the cod disappear in the river in his lifetime, but that I was going to witness before very long. A few years later, I married a diver. He dove at Les Escoumins and he saw a lot of gutted and eviscerated cod carcasses at the bottom of the St. Lawrence. Obviously, we were told that it was the seals that were eating the cod viscera.
That was a pretty long time ago. Today, we are seeing an extreme decline in the resource, exactly as my father said. I am sure he was not the only one who foresaw the situation.
To what extent has scientific research done in the field been taken into account in the last 25 years? Is that research integral to your thinking and your actions?