GEAC seeks solutions that minimize affect on fishing industry
St. John’s – The Government of Canada is working towards an international commitment to protect 10% of its marine areas by 2020. The Groundfish Enterprise Allocation Council (GEAC), which represents large-vessel groundfish harvesters in Atlantic Canada, understands and accepts that commitment. GEAC, along with other industry groups, have been working cooperatively with the Department of Fisheries and Oceans to define sensitive areas for protection. Most of the area closures to-date have focused on sensitive benthic (seabed) areas with the objective of protecting high concentrations of corals and sponges. For that reason, bottom-contact fishing has been excluded in these areas.
GEAC’s approach to the challenge has been to fulfill Canada’s international commitment while minimizing impacts on ocean users, especially the fishing industry, whose activities are so important to the livelihoods of Atlantic Canadians, and the economies of rural and urban areas.
“Our concern is to the extent that activity by other ocean users (e.g. oil and gas) represents a significant risk to these coral and sponge concentrations, then the area may become ineligible to be counted towards the 10% goal. This would mean that the difficult sacrifices made by the fishing industry to achieve Canada’s target would become futile,” explained Kris Vascotto, Executive Director of GEAC. “Given Government’s commitment to reaching the established target, the inevitable result is yet additional areas being closed to fishing activity and ultimately, the fishing industry suffering more than it should to help achieve the 10% protection target.”
GEAC is calling on DFO to work closer with both the fishing and oil and gas industries to achieve protection targets that treat the two industries fairly and minimize impacts to both.
“Removing one industry threat to coral and sponge concentrations without also addressing threats to these features from other industries does nothing to achieve Canada’s marine protection goals. The ideal solution is to define areas for protection that don’t affect any ocean user,” Vascotto suggested. “To the extent this is not possible, then the activity of all ocean users should be critically examined to determine the risk and level of threat to the marine feature being protected, with all industry users being treated fairly. These risk assessments should have been done before areas were closed only to bottom-contact fishing. We need DFO to clarify this matter before fish harvesters are subjected to any additional area closures.”
More effective communication also needed
GEAC has also highlighted the need for more effective communication from DFO on protected areas. Routine ‘Notices to Fishers’ is not an adequate means of communicating such a significant change for harvesters who have been fishing in these areas for decades. DFO should be consulting about such changes directly with applicable fishers and providing more effective advance notice than we’ve seen thus far.
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Media Contact:
Sarah Fleming, Director of Communications, GEAC
709.725.5830 I [email protected]
About GEAC
The Groundfish Enterprise Allocation Council is a non-profit industry association representing year-round groundfish harvesters in Atlantic Canada. GEAC contributes to research that will improve the sustainability and management of groundfish fisheries by actively supporting science, sustainability certifications and responsible management.