Who will remain on the water with access to salmon as the federal government reshapes the industry?
Ottawa has shuttered approximately 60 per cent of B.C.’s commercial fisheries since 2021 and last month launched a licence buyback program to lure fish harvesters to exit the industry to protect plummeting salmon stocks.
If Fisheries and Oceans Canada fails to make policy changes as the salmon licences and total catch decline, fishing wealth will continue to slip away to urban areas and those with lots of capital. Demand and speculation push the purchase price beyond the reach of independent fish harvesters — especially young ones without deep pockets — leading to the rise of an “investor class” of corporations, investors or retired fishermen.
The largest salmon fishery, the seine sector takes about 50 per cent of the total harvest and is already dominated by the province’s largest fish processor, Canfisco, part of the Jim Pattison Group, Thorkelson said. In 2019, the House of Commons committee on fisheries and oceans , issued a report to the government centred on fisheries and equity issues on the Pacific Coast.
DFO can’t predict who will remain on the water as the licence retirements are voluntary, the ministry said in an email to Canada’s National Observer. The ministry didn’t clarify when, how or if equitable distribution of fishing benefits, including quota or licences, is part of the plan for the fishery once the buyback process is complete in three years’ time.
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