There are 41 of 48 zones closed, and there's no fishing there. What are the clams doing? Well, they're growing bigger. They're not being harvested.
Back when the Société de développement de l'industrie maricole committee was chaired by Marcel Landry, the former assistant deputy minister for the regions, there was an opportunity to harvest 150 tonnes of softshell clams per year, but unfortunately, Mr. Landry did not see this harvesting project through to completion. It was a commercial harvest for which we wanted to open a decontamination plant for certain clams that didn't meet standards.
Where I come from, when we talk about “walking on the flats”, we mean the spot where there's no more water and there's sand. You can see the holes the clams make to breathe, and you're constantly stepping in those holes. That means there's a lot of clams there. You've got to experience that at least once in your life. By the way, I'd like to invite you all to tour this area to see what it's really like and go clam digging. I think we wouldn't be here having this conversation because we'd all be out there digging up clams.