The Canadian government’s Standing Committee
on Fisheries visited my town early last year, and happened
to be another in a series of committees, commissions,
judicial inquiries, and individual fact-finding groups
who come around—year after year it seems—and
never accomplish much. Pacific salmon continue to swim
towards the lake called Oblivion.
Sadly, two countries, the province of British Columbia
and three Pacific northwest states are unable to agree
how to help the fish. BC added to morass the previous
year by introducing Fisheries Renewal BC to further
complicate the do-good scene. Within the past six years,
the Canadian government sent John Fraser, a former
federal fisheries minister; Art May, president of Memorial
University in Newfoundland, and, most recently, Appellate
Court Judge Sam Toy to find solutions.
Fraser, a West Coast boy and ardent recreational angler, "done
good" in writing his thesis for the feds. He best
understood the problems but Canada’s highest-ranking
bureaucrats (who once worked under him) did not react
very strongly. Fish stocks continue to dwindle.
Despite enjoying high status in the academic world,
May did not solve the problem either.
And with due respect to Toy, hizoner is not likely
to succeed but will, of course, be paid handsomely,
as all his predecessors were.
I wish I could get consulting money. I know I won’t.
Governments never want to hear the truth, or to introduce
the obvious solution. For one thing, it would antagonize
big business.
My background is not very academic. It includes 50
years as a newspaper journalist, mainly as a sports/outdoors
writer. I did successfully pass the Canadian Investment
Dealers’ course but never took my economic understanding
to market. I simply was having too much fun newspapering.
I was an executive with both the Outdoor Writers of
Canada (OWC) and the Northwest Outdoor Writers Association
(NOWA) for 11 years, and an "ordinary" member
in another six or eight years.
I first started fishing on the West Coast in 1957,
very soon after I arrived in Victoria. My interest
in the fish and outdoor resources reached extreme and
passionate levels 18 years ago with the birth of my
first grandchild. And now, as I informed the Standing
Committee, I am determined to do anything I can to
assure my grandchildren, and yours, expectation to
a fishing experience. Hopefully, that passionate expectation
will go far, far into the future.
Since I have identified myself as an officer of both
OWC and NOWA, the comments and observations contained
herein are strictly mine, and are not to be taken as
policy or a statement from those organizations.
The respected task forces and well-educated academics,
I would suggest, always seem to hit roadblocks: governments.
I will be the first to admit they, the cause finders,
do not have an easy task. Not now, and never have in
the past.
Much has been said about the high level of incompetence
within the Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO)
bureaucracy. Much of what has been said is true, but
it is not because the bureaucrats at the highest level
lack knowledge. They simply bow with political winds
and are not interested in my grandchildren, or yours.
No one in Ottawa has every asked to see the pictures
of my Munchkins, or yours, holding up their catches.
Mismanagement is only part of the problem. Variables
such as the weather condition, El Nino, are a resource
destroyer. Over-fishing also can be blamed.
The greatest problem is the destruction of habitat.
It is intense, it is fierce, and it is most damaging.
Governments must put clamps on free-for-all forestry
practices, construction of dams, ignorance and unbearing
tolerance in allowing municipalities to dump their
sewage into the most available waterway, and random,
unchecked development. Regional and provincial governments,
motivated by greed and other undue influences, are
too quick to approve any development because it enlarges
their tax base.
The East Coast of Vancouver Island is a perfect example.
First and foremost, forest companies and BC Hydro had
their own way in past years, a free ticket to destroy
magnificent fish-bearing streams and lakes. Then development
became rampant.
In my first decade on Vancouver Island, the Strait
of Georgia supported approximately 90 per cent of the
recreational salmon-fishing industry in BC. Property
development expanded on both sides of the strait but
I know the Island situation best. I confine observation
to the Island.
When I first arrived, the major municipalities were
Victoria, Duncan, Nanaimo, Port Alberni, Qualicum-Parksville,
Courtenay-Comox and Campbell River, or roughly six
in a 250-mile stretch. There was not much between.
Today, that waterfront from Victoria to Campbell River
is a never-ending stretch of homes, shopping malls,
parking lots, and other businesses.
There has been improvement. That turn toward sanity
was inspired by the recreational-fishing sector. Not
by the commercial industry, not by the high-level DFO
bureaucrats, not by the forest managers, not by community
planners, and only rarely by politicians. Canada’s
fisheries portfolio is an insignificant one to the
Great Men of the East, the politicians in Ottawa. Because
of insignificance, Ministers are appointed far too
quickly and most lack the needed knowledge to be effective.
We would have been better served by Moe, Larry, Shep
and Curly, four of the six "Three Stooges" in
old films.
In their never-ending parades, the fact-finders always
hear—many times—arguments for sharing the
resource. Sharing should be on the low end of the priority
totem pole, in Canada’s dispute with the U.S.
and in BC’s fights with Alaska.
First and foremost, above all else, greatest consideration
must be for the fish. The mandate is to save the dwindling
stocks, not to distribute the remaining stragglers.
The richly-paid commercial lobbyists insist on alienating
the recreational sector instead of—the sensible
ploy—teaming up with "the sporties," the
First Nations and environmentalists. United, all could
contribute sensibility to a decent solution.
The pity of our is system is the influential bureaucrats
lack courage to stand up to the politicians. Politicians,
in turn, must realize the party line may not supply
the best solution. By being wise, and not pretending,
governments "may" return to intelligent governing.
I have a biologist’s assurance that salmon are
a resilient species, among the most adaptable critters
on the face of our earth. Fish stocks are capable of
recovering. Look only to the Gulf Coast and consider
what Texas, Louisiana, Florida and Mississippi accomplished.
Gulf stocks of the popular redfish and speckled trout
began to disappear. Inspired by "sporties," specifically
the Gulf Coast Conservation Association, Gulf states
shut down commercial fishing of those species.
In a decade, the rebound was so great commercial netting
was restored, wherever possible.
Aiding recovery were biologists who discovered a way
to fool the redfish sow. With changes in light and
water temperatures, the sows started to produce two
litters a year instead of one.
That brings us to another failing of the federal government
in Canada. It reduces budgets for the scientists and
rarely touches the bureaucratic monkeys. While I have
no respect whatsoever for high-level DFO bureaucrats,
my respect for Fisheries lower echelons is very high.
Canadian biologists have international respect, have
accomplished much. This is not the time to reduce their
ranks. Nor is this the time to reduce budgets for conservation
officers or enhancement.
Having watched top bureaucrats and politicians bumble
around in meaningless fashion for many years, I now
am tempted to pray for the Great Black Plague to make
a comeback and strike down all who refuse to protect
our fish resources.
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