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The SFI is committed to advocating on behalf of its membership and actively following the interests of the sport fishing sector in British Columbia. We will use this area to post relevant information about issues of the day. And, watch for SFI or SFI CTAG updates on Twitter.
Questions about a particular issue or topic? Please feel free to contact our office by phone at 604.270.3439 or e-mail
There has been much discussion regarding the 2012 change to government's halibut allocation policy and addressing ways to strive for certainty and stability for this year. While we don't want to revisit those issues here, we do want to offer some thoughts on an aspect of the decision that has received less attention.
As part of the policy announcement, DFO said that it plans to make last year's experimental pilot program for halibut leasing a permanent fixture of the recreational fishery. This program was an unmitigated disaster last year, with few participants, few fish recorded and with widespread acknowledgement from the department that it lacks the staff and resources to police or effectively monitor the program in any meaningful way.
We believe that the program is unnecessary and divisive. It attempts to create user-group distinctions within the recreational fishery where none exist. The recreational quota leasing program is inappropriate as it turns recreational fishing into a quazi-commercial harvesting activity; it seeks to create different classes of recreational anglers when all recreational anglers ought to have equal access to a Canadian public resource; it unjustly enriches a small number of commercial quota holders; and, it simply distracts anglers from government's principal error which was granting private property rights to a Canadian public resource.
Ultimately we remain firm in our belief that a fixed number allocation system or some method to permit the entire recreational sector to acquire certain and stable access to halibut for a full and predictable season should be employed.
Many in the sport fishing sector have deep concerns about the impacts of salmon farming on our vital wild salmon stocks. These concerns have intensified in recent months with the new debate over the implications of infectious salmon anemia (ISA) for wild salmon stocks. The SFI has been raising serious questions about the impact of fish farms on wild fish stocks for more than a decade. To that end, the SFI board of directors adopted a formal policy in 2003, urging the federal and provincial governments to adopt the precautionary principle and ensure that they were not licensing fish farming activities that could impact wild fish stocks. We have communicated this view to federal and provincial politicians and senior civil servants in writing and during our frequent meetings with them. Indeed the board was so concerned about the need to understand the emerging science on fish farming, that it invited Craig Orr and Alexandra Morton to make formal presentations at both our BOD meetings and at our annual industry policy conference....a conference, incidentally that is well attended by the senior decision makers from both the federal and provincial governments.
In 2006, the SFI made a formal presentation to the provincial legislature’s special committee reviewing finfish aquaculture and urged the committee to establish a clear scientific consensus on the issue and provide recreational anglers with assurances that wild stocks were not being placed at risk by fish farming activities. We were pleased when that committee recommended a moratorium on new fish farming activities but disappointed when government chose to ignore the committee’s recommendations.
The SFI has also decided to support the development of new closed containment technology aimed at eliminating the threat of disease and/or lice transfer between farmed and wild fish stocks. To that end, board member Dr. Gerry Kristianson, (who also serves as the chair of the Sport Fish Advisory Board and is a long serving Pacific Salmon Commissioner) has been actively involved in the development of a new closed-containment pilot project. Dr. Kristianson serves on the board of the Middle Bay Sustainable Aquaculture Institute that is field testing a floating closed-containment fish farm off Northern Vancouver Island. If this project proves successful, it will provide an on-the-shelf technology that could well become the industry standard for fish farming in British Columbia.
The SFI has not made salmon farming the centerpiece of its lobbying efforts because several other groups have dedicated considerable time and resources to this issue and we feel it makes strategic sense to focus our efforts on access and allocation issues. That said, we will continue to raise the concerns with Ottawa and support those who are seeking to reform salmon aquaculture in BC.