DFO shutting down herring, mackerel fisheries on East Coast

Federal Fisheries Minister Joyce Murray introduced Wednesday there shall be no industrial or bait fishing for herring within the Gulf of St. Lawrence and Atlantic mackerel in Atlantic Canada and Quebec.

The Division of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) mentioned pressing motion needed to be taken to provide the shares an opportunity to get better and to make sure the long-term sustainability and prosperity of East Coast fisheries.

However the determination isn’t sitting properly with the fishing neighborhood.

“We’re shocked by this radical determination on the a part of Minister Murray,” mentioned Martin Mallet, the manager director of the Maritime Fishermen’s Union, which represents greater than 1,300 fishermen.

“We’re appalled on the impression of this determination on our fishers [and] the coastal communities and employees who depend upon these fisheries.”

Herring and mackerel play a significant function in each the fishing business and ocean ecosystems. They’re an necessary meals supply for different species, together with tuna and Atlantic cod. However they’re additionally a conventional supply of bait in lots of industrial fisheries, together with lobster, snow crab and halibut.

“We aren’t positive how this determination goes to have an effect on the general provide and entry to bait, or the worth,” mentioned Mallet.

Mallet mentioned the closures would have an “atomic bomb impression.”

He mentioned DFO didn’t contact the union concerning the closures previous to the announcement.

The sentiment was shared by officers of the Fish, Meals and Allied Employees Union, which mentioned fish harvesters have been “shocked” by Wednesday’s announcement. Union president Keith Sullivan mentioned in a press release launched Wednesday fishers would undergo from the choice.

“Asserting a moratorium on the mackerel fishery is yet one more instance of how [the Fisheries Department] and Minister Joyce Murray would relatively get rid of livelihoods than do the precise work that must be carried out,” Sullivan mentioned

The moratorium shouldn’t come as a complete shock. DFO has undertaken many measures in the previous couple of years to replenish the species. For herring, it carried out each day catch limits, minimal mesh gap dimension in nets, and put limits on the general dimension and variety of nets.

However the measures haven’t been sufficient as shares have reached what DFO calls a “important zone.” Now DFO is hoping decreased fishing will assist the shares mature and reproduce.

Katie Schleit, senior fishing adviser with Oceans North, a charitable group that fosters science and community-based conservation applications, wasn’t shocked by the announcement.

“This sort of information is difficult to digest but it surely’s been a very long time coming,” she mentioned. “These two specific forage shares have been critically depleted for greater than a decade and sadly this was the one determination left to make.”

The closures shall be revisited by DFO following the subsequent inventory assessments.

Meals, social and ceremonial fisheries for First Nation communities will stay open for each herring and Atlantic mackerel.

The leisure fishery for mackerel will even stay open, however the each day restrict of 20 mackerel that was put into place final yr will stay.