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Author Topic: An Overview of Where We Are re: Steelhead & Salmon  (Read 2113 times)

IronNoggin

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An Overview of Where We Are re: Steelhead & Salmon
« on: April 20, 2018, 12:35:41 PM »

The Mid-Stream Report

Now that we’re well along in a number of processes that the steelhead advocacy community has dedicated unprecedented effort toward over the past many months, let’s have an overview of where those efforts have taken us.

COSEWIC and SARA – The clock continues to countdown the 90 day period during which a response from Minister McKenna on the recommendation of the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada (COSEWIC) for endangered species status for Interior Fraser steelhead (IFS) must be provided. With 64 of those days behind us and the deadline for plans for the 2018 fisheries sharply in focus, the silence is deafening.

MSC Certification – The armour protecting the certification of the Fraser River chum fishery as “sustainable” by the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) continues to be impenetrable. It boggles the mind that this fishery passes the red face test and the market for its products remains convinced it is clean, green and beyond reproach.

IFMPs, 2018 Edition – Our illustrious Department of Fisheries and Oceans continues on its planning process treadmill to develop Integrated Fisheries Management Plans (IFMPs) that we’re told will govern the 2018 fisheries on both the north and south coasts of British Columbia. The respective processes in the north and south bear little resemblance. In the north, the impending suite of regulations includes complete shutdown of commercial and recreational fisheries for chinook and sockeye, as well as major constraints on First Nations fisheries for both those species. In the south, with considerably worse conservation issues facing chinook and many sockeye stocks, there are no such punitive measures contemplated. Recreational fisheries will undoubtedly be restricted and commercial fisheries will also be constrained but I see no evidence the plethora of FNs spread throughout the Fraser system will be subjected to anywhere near similar restraint. The impending worse case scenario for steelhead in both the Skeena and Fraser systems is DFO will turn a blind eye to their conservation status and, indirectly, encourage FN fisheries to harvest them by promoting fisheries for coho (Skeena) and chum (Fraser) whose run timing is well understood to be a perfect overlap with steelhead. That is precisely what happened in 2017.

IFS Recovery – In circulation as we speak is a document outlining DFO’s proposal to “recover” Interior Fraser Steelhead. The centerpiece of that document is what DFO refers to as rolling window closures (i.e. a sequential series of temporal and spatial commercial fishing closures) the latest computer model predicts will “protect 90% of the IFS with a high degree of certainty”. The plan has been condemned by every credible steelhead advocacy group in BC. The Marine Conservation Caucus, a group of well informed scientists and related stakeholders whose collective experience and expertise dwarfs that of the current cast of DFO characters involved, has also condemned the so called recovery plan. The best estimate I can offer after reviewing the publicly available information is that the proposed rolling closures, if fully implemented and enforced, would probably deliver another two dozen steelhead to the waiting gauntlet of FN nets upstream of the last commercial fishing vessel.

Skeena Prognostications – For the Skeena, all signals point to another down year for steelhead. The certainty around predictions is chronically low but one should not be ignoring the trends in the abundance of sockeye and chinook, both of which have received far more attention over the decades. Both are predicted to be at critically low levels. It is not a stretch to suggest steelhead occupying the identical ocean environments at the same time would not be subject to the same forces limiting those other two species. Has anyone heard of any contingency plan to address another poor year when steelhead stocks will be even worse off as a result of the FN fisheries that will be re-focused from sockeye and chinook to coho and steelhead?

Fraser Prognostications – The Fraser outlook mirrors the Skeena with the exception those IFS are an order of magnitude worse off. It is extremely unlikely there will be any more steelhead approaching the Fraser in 2018 than there were in 2017. The recreational fishery has fallen on its sword and recommended complete angling closure. This is the only measure possible to try and sell FN fishers (and DFO) on conservation of IFS. Sadly, catch and release is broadly interpreted by FNs as evidence in support of their position there can’t be a conservation concern when anglers are still on the water playing with food guaranteed them under the Canadian constitution.

Who’s Home? – If ever there was a time when the provincial government that has the mandate to manage steelhead in the non-tidal waters of the province is missing in action, this is it. The current regime is on record with the pronouncement in the provincial legislature by Minister Donaldson that his office (Forests, Lands, Natural Resource Operations and Rural Development or FLNRORD) is the one stop shop for steelhead. Weigh that against freedom of information material discussed on this site earlier that reveals the Ministry of Agriculture is the big kid on the block in terms of steelhead related interactions with the federal government. If that isn’t enough convincing of who is the voice of the province and what priority steelhead are accorded we can look to the formal record of several more exchanges in the legislature in recent weeks. Among them are the fact the word fish (much less steelhead) never appears in the current fiscal year’s budget pronouncements of Minister Donaldson. In fact the only mentions of fish during the legislative debates of Donaldson’s Ministry budget came from opposition critics. One of them wanted to raise the issue of goldfish in Dragon Lake. The other was from another opposition member from the north coast who wanted to emphasize the importance of salmon (chinook, sockeye and coho were the species mentioned) to the people of British Columbia. The response to his rather long and biased speech came, not from Donaldson, but from a back bench colleague whose office is in Prince Rupert, the heartland of the north coast commercial fishing industry. A quote tells all:

“The Minister of Agriculture is representing the interests of our province on the Pacific Salmon Commission, negotiating with the United States in order to address things like by-catch and overfishing, in order to maintain these industries and keep fishing sustainable.”


So, there we have it. Those Agriculture people headed by Minister Popham whose mandate it is to promote BC seafood products and advance the interests of the commercial fishing industry that has devastated Interior Fraser Steelhead stocks are clearly in charge of dealing with their federal counterparts on all such issues. Shame on you Minister Donaldson for stating and continuing to imply otherwise.

Conservation Dilemmas – Slavish adherence to policies and practices that have no quantifiable connection and unmeasured impact on fixed and declining fish resources already in crisis is a travesty. How many times are we going to hear about the United Nations Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous People (UNDRIP) before someone actually figures out what its implications are and will be? The same goes for the Food, Social and Ceremonial (FSC) fisheries that our political leaders turn a blind eye to while empowering the most rapidly growing segment of BC’s population to fish on the premise the word “no” doesn’t exist. Those of us who dare suggest supply and demand need to be co-ordinated are immediately branded as racist. When the resource that 96% of this province’s population is forbidden from using so the interests of the other 4% can be accommodated fades into the history books, then what?

http://steelheadvoices.com/
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