Good afternoon. My name is Emily Orr. I'm the business agent for the United Fishermen and Allied Workers' Union.
I'd like to thank the committee for taking this incredibly important study forward. We're very grateful to you for that.
As you know, the Pacific region doesn't have a licence policy to restrict foreign ownership or corporate concentration of fishing access. The resulting situation is that Canadian independent owner-operator fish harvesters are being outbid, outbought and increasingly pushed out of Canada’s west coast fisheries.
The benefits of commercial fishing should flow to those doing the work and taking the risk and to the adjacent coastal communities. Coastal economies are suffering visible economic drain as those benefits instead go increasingly and unchecked to offshore investors.
Reconciliation objectives involving fisheries access are challenged by competition with foreign investment and corporate concentration, and domestic food security is being wilfully overlooked.
The east coast has an owner-operator policy. You'll hear later in the study from Rick Williams, who will provide compelling statistics that compare harvester incomes and industry economics from east to west.
In the delivery of the PIIFCAF policy to the east coast in 2007, fisheries Minister Shea said,
The goal of the PIIFCAF Policy is to strengthen the Owner-Operator and Fleet Separation Policies to ensure that inshore fish harvesters remain independent, and that the benefits of fishing licences flow to the fisher and to Atlantic coastal communities.
DFO's stated objectives of that policy are to:
reaffirm the importance of maintaining an independent and economically viable inshore fleet;
strengthen the application of the Owner-Operator and Fleet Separation policies;
ensure that the benefits of fishing licences flow to the fish harvester and the coastal community; and
assist fish harvesters to retain control of their fishing enterprises.
These are the things that we are seeking for the west coast. The question that has yet to be answered is why an owner-operator policy hasn't been developed also for the west coast.
Earlier this year, the UFAWU launched a parliamentary petition to request the minister to put an immediate stop to any further foreign ownership or beneficial interest in commercial licences and quotas—recommendation two of the FOPO report “Sharing Risks and Benefits”—as no tangible action by DFO with regard to this recommendation has been taken so far.
In 2018, half of the $60 million in licence and quota purchases were by foreign investors. Six licence-holders had more than 50 licences each, and 1.2% of the quota owners held more than 50% of the quota pounds.
DFO has advised that the beneficial ownership survey is the step they've taken in response to calls for policy change and that it's necessary to better understand the scope of the issue of foreign and corporate ownership. The survey was directed to “licence-holders”, not “licence owners”. This slip of semantics should effectively nullify the results of the survey, as the licence-holder and the licence owner are not necessarily the same, which is central to the overall problem.
I’m a second-generation fish harvester who, after 12 years of fishing and learning my way to running the boat myself, could not compete to buy my parent's fishing licence. It ultimately sold to a processor in Vancouver and the boat went to Alaska.
In previous work as a fish coordinator for PICFI's CFE, or commercial fishing enterprise, I was responsible for tendering the licences and quotas for those nations. It was 10 times out of 10 that the companies outbid the independent harvesters. This drove licence lease prices up almost 50% higher.
One of the lifelong harvesters I work with is currently looking to retire and sell his boat and licence. The first offer came on day one, from a company.
Another harvester I work with fishes geoduck, which involves dangerous underwater harvest. He is responsible 100% for the physical risk and 100% for the cost of the vessel operations and the expenses of the crew, yet receives only 22% of the landed value of the catch.
These experiences are not unique. In fact, they have become the norm.
I’m here today on behalf of fish harvesters who still have aspirations to become owner-operators, on behalf of coastal communities who rely on fisheries to stay viable, on behalf of British Columbians concerned about domestic food security and on behalf of Canadians who deserve better management of our common property fisheries resource.
Thank you.