THE STANDING SENATE COMMITTEE ON FISHERIES AND OCEANS
EVIDENCE
OTTAWA, Tuesday, April 21, 2026
The Standing Senate Committee on Fisheries and Oceans met with videoconference this day at 6:32 p.m. [ET] to examine and report on the commercial fisheries licensing regime on Canada’s Pacific Coast.
Senator Fabian Manning (Chair) in the chair.
[English]
The Chair: Good evening. My name is Fabian Manning. I’m a senator from Newfoundland and Labrador and have the privilege of chairing this committee.
Should any technical challenges arise, particularly in relation to interpretation, please signal them to me or to the clerk, and we will work to resolve your issue.
Before we begin, I would like to take a few moments to allow the members of the committee to introduce themselves.
Senator Ince: Tony Ince from Nova Scotia.
Senator Ravalia: Mohamed Ravalia, Newfoundland and Labrador.
Senator Cuzner: Rodger Cuzner from Nova Scotia.
Senator Surette: Allister Surette from Nova Scotia.
Senator Busson: Bev Busson from British Columbia. Welcome.
The Chair: Thank you, senators.
On November 18, 2025, the Standing Senate Committee on Fisheries and Oceans was authorized to examine and report on the commercial fisheries licensing regime on Canada’s Pacific Coast. Today, under this mandate, the committee will be hearing, via video conference, from the following individual: Mr. Mike Frost, Director, Fisheries and Fleet Management of Canfisco Group, British Columbia.
On behalf of the members of the committee, I thank Mr. Frost for joining us this evening. I understand that you have some opening remarks. Following these, I’m sure we will have some questions from our senators.
Welcome. The floor is yours, Mr. Frost.
Mike Frost, Director, Fisheries and Fleet Management, Canfisco Group: Thank you, and I appreciate the opportunity to speak with all of you today. I wish I could be with you in person. I have some surrounding meetings and am unable to attend in person.
I want to begin by emphasizing that commercial fisheries on Canada’s Pacific Coast operate under conditions that are fundamentally different from those in beautiful Atlantic Canada. Pacific fisheries are smaller in scale and highly variable, and many are multi-species. West Coast harvesters now rely on access to several fisheries to remain viable, and in many cases the available harvest cannot sustain large numbers of fully independent fish harvesters as owner-operators.
As a result, it is access to the resource — not ownership structure alone — that is the defining challenge in the Pacific. In several fisheries, there are currently too many licences to support economically sound harvest opportunities, and significant fleet rationalization has occurred in the Pacific over many decades. Any approach to licensing reform must reflect these structural realities rather than apply models developed for fundamentally different fisheries.
The Pacific region also operates within an established advisory framework, set out in the 2004 policy governing regional advisory bodies. That framework emphasizes transparency, representation and fishery-specific design. Where change may be warranted, it should begin with a review of that policy and engagement with existing advisory bodies. Unilateral changes to advisory structures, particularly without clear definitions or rationale, risk undermining confidence in the process rather than strengthening governance.
Resource access constraints have also intensified over time. Conservation measures, licence limitation, quota-based management and fleet rationalization have all reduced entry points for commercial fish harvesters in the Pacific region. At the same time, important and distinct policy objectives — such as reconciliation initiatives, marine protected area expansion and licence retirement programs — continue to shape the distribution and availability of fishing opportunities in B.C. While these initiatives each serve legitimate purposes, their combined effect is a progressively tighter and more conditional access environment for the commercial sector.
This context is essential when discussing ownership, equity and participation in fish harvesting in B.C.
It is important to acknowledge harvester perspectives here. Many harvesters face real barriers to entry and ongoing participation, including high capital costs and — in some quota‑managed fisheries — lease rates that are widely viewed as unfair. These concerns are not abstract; they directly affect fleet stability, workforce renewal and the economic viability of fishing enterprises. Again, access is the challenge in the Pacific region.
Throughout my career as a fisheries and fleet manager, I have approached these realities with the clear understanding that sustainable fisheries depend on sustainable relationships. Those relationships can only be maintained through fair, transparent and affordable financial arrangements that provide mutual benefit and allow harvesters to remain viable over the long term.
In an environment of constrained access, processor-supported financing and mentorship can play a constructive role when done responsibly. Support mechanisms that provide affordable financing, access to vessels and equipment and structured pathways to licences can help create entry points that would otherwise not exist. However, these arrangements are not a substitute for a coherent access policy, and they are most effective when aligned with clear governance and predictable rules.
In closing, the central issue facing commercial fisheries is not simply the structure of licence ownership but also the scarcity and allocation of access. Owner-operator principles remain relevant, but their practical application depends on addressing underlying access constraints in a coordinated, fishery-specific manner. Without that foundation, structural reforms risk limited effectiveness or unintended consolidation, rather than broader participation and equitable outcomes.
Thank you.
The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Frost. We have been joined by Senator Dhillon from your home province of British Columbia. Our first questions will be from Senator Busson, our deputy chair, followed by Senator Cuzner.
Senator Busson: Thank you very much for being here today, even if it is by teleconference. I understand your time is very valuable.
The background to your company is that it was formed from a company in 1906 and joined the Jim Pattison Group in 1984, and another part of your work and website talks about the fact that you’re the largest fishing fleet in British Columbia, and you also fish in Washington State and Alaska.
That’s some of the background information that we were supplied with.
Can you tell me how many Canadian employees or contractors are part of the Canfisco Group?
Mr. Frost: No, ma’am, not accurately. Canfisco Group does have operations in British Columbia, Alaska and Washington. We began in B.C., and it is a large part of our business.
We have operations in Vancouver, Richmond, Port Hardy and Prince Rupert. We have a processing plant in Delta, British Columbia, that is part of Canfisco Group as well. I would be guessing at the number of employees that we had in B.C.
Senator Busson: If I might just expand on that, I’m wondering whether you have an interest in all the commercial fisheries in British Columbia.
Mr. Frost: No, we do not. Canfisco is really built on salmon and herring fisheries in British Columbia. Those fisheries have become challenging in recent decades. It is still a big part of our B.C. operations. But we only participate in British Columbia in salmon and herring, and we have some hook-and-line fisheries that are halibut-directed and some trout fisheries as well. Those are the backbones of our business here in B.C.
Senator Busson: I have one more question, just to set the context for where we might be going here as we move forward. We have been told by a number of other witnesses that the registry of licence holders in British Columbia is obscure and not transparent; you talked in your presentation about the transparency of the fishery and how important it is that this is part of how it moves forward. Could you talk to me a little bit about the licence holder registry?
Mr. Frost: Yes, that’s something that is publicly available, but I agree with you. The names that are attached to vessel-based or party-based licences can be numbered companies. The actual ownership is not transparently produced or widely distributed. It can be somewhat ambiguous as to who actually owns licences within the licensing system.
Senator Busson: So part of that group that has numbered companies that hold the licences as you carry on the fishery?
Mr. Frost: Most of the Canfisco licences are owned by Canfisco or Jim Pattison enterprises. There are some that are owned by some numbered companies.
As you know, Canfisco was built in a willing seller, willing buyer environment in B.C. There has been some acquisition of licences from other companies where, perhaps, the companies were bought along with the licences.
Senator Busson: Thank you.
Senator Cuzner: You just referred to the willing seller, willing buyer environment, and in the wake of the Marshall decision on the East Coast, that’s how accommodations have been reached with First Nations communities in a lot of those harbours. But you mentioned that rationalization has taken place in the past. Could you sort of expand on that?
It seems that if there were any kind of rationalization, it went to the highest bidder. The licences ended up going to the highest bidder. You are shaking your head, so could you walk us through the rationalization and if, in fact, independent fishers were given an opportunity to gain access to that?
Mr. Frost: The thing that comes to mind, senator, is the recent Pacific Salmon Strategy Initiative. It was sort of a reverse buyback. All licence holders had an option to relinquish their licence, in effect, to retire their licence from the fishery to remove that licence from participating in the fishery in a sort of reverse auction. There were no bidders. Licence holders were asked to put a number down on an application for DFO as opposed to Fisheries and Oceans saying what the licence would be bought for.
So, all licence holders were provided with applications to relinquish a vessel-based licence.
Senator Cuzner: It was DFO that was buying back the licence?
Mr. Frost: That is correct. You may be familiar with the Pacific Salmon Strategy Initiative. It’s a five-year program that has just been renewed.
Senator Cuzner: But it would have been through a similar program that you would have bought them directly from a licence holder?
Mr. Frost: Yes, that is correct, at times.
Senator Cuzner: So you’re saying one of the biggest problems is the reduced number of points of entry, but still you continue to say that there are too many licences out there now. Is that contradictory?
Mr. Frost: No, sir, I don’t think so. I’ll give you a couple of examples. Right now, there are probably around 1,200 roe herring gillnet licences in B.C. There are certainly not 1,200 roe herring gillnet harvesters in B.C. Even if there were, in 2026, there would have been about four tonnes of herring attached to that licence. Companies probably pay in the range of between $400 and $800 a tonne. It is not an economic opportunity. You have too many licences and are too few fish harvesters.
In that fishery, for instance, companies like the one that I work for acquire licences, gather licences, pay licence holders a lease for that quota and provide them free of charge to fish harvesters.
Another example of too many licences and too few fish harvesters and too few fish really is our salmon fishery. When you look at the number of seine licences that are in B.C. — which have been drastically reduced through the Salmon Strategy Initiative Program by DFO in the past five years — there are still too many chasing too few. That is an access and resource management problem.
I don’t know whether you follow B.C., but we had almost 9 million sockeye returned to the Fraser in 2025. In Area B, seine licences were granted 800 sockeye to catch. It’s not an economic opportunity.
Senator Cuzner: If you could sort of share with the committee, on the various species that you do pursue, what percentage of the total quota would Canfisco hold?
Mr. Frost: If you look at our northern fishery last year for salmon, for instance, there were probably, at the peak, 20 seine vessels fishing, which would equate to about 100 crew members. Canfisco would have had about six of those.
We have a plant in Prince Rupert. We want to feed it fish. We have people who work in our plants. We want to employ them. Without landings, of course, we can’t do that.
In the south, you would probably double that. Perhaps I’m not answering your question. If I think about all the salmon licences in British Columbia — and I’m not sure what the total number is — but I think Canfisco or the Pattison Group would have about 20% of those licences.
Senator Cuzner: I have one more quick question. I know it’s different; they fish year-round as opposed to the East Coast, where it’s more seasonal. Regarding plant workers and even crew, do you use a fair number of temporary foreign workers or are they mainly full-time workers on the shop floor?
Mr. Frost: In our processing plant, we have foreign workers that we have been able to bring over through government programs and have work in our plants.
It’s not what I think, but I guess the fishing industry is not all that sexy these days for young folks. I think it’s a great place to be. We have full-time employees at our processing plants in Delta. We keep full-time staff in Richmond, Port Hardy and Prince Rupert, but on the shop floor, our fish cutters and our unloaders are variable.
Our seasons in the north have gone from four to five months long to about five weeks long. We are down to dribs and drabs here. The salmon fishery in particular is in real trouble in British Columbia. There are a number of reasons for that, but one of them is the way that Fisheries and Oceans Canada is managing fish stocks in B.C., especially when one reviews what happened in 2025 on the Fraser River.
Senator Cuzner: Thanks very much.
Mr. Frost: Thank you.
Senator Ravalia: Thank you, Mr. Frost. Could you outline for me the concerns you might have with respect to foreign ownership in the West Coast fishery, including the establishment of complex corporate structures?
Mr. Frost: Are you asking for a personal view on it or how it affects our industry in B.C.? Can you clarify the question?
Senator Ravalia: Just in terms of your own personal economic impacts and the impacts on the general viability of the fishery as a whole.
Mr. Frost: I don’t see it as a significant issue in British Columbia. Some companies — perhaps processors — may have foreign ownership. Canfisco Group is not one of those companies, but I believe that those companies still provide fair access to their fish harvesters and try to do the same sort of support, such as financing and offering of opportunities.
Essentially, perhaps, other companies who have foreign ownership still provide access points and support for commercial fish harvesters to provide benefit to them.
Senator Ravalia: Just to switch gears a little bit, what has the impact of aquaculture been on the industry as a whole in British Columbia?
Mr. Frost: That’s a tough question to answer. Aquaculture is big business in B.C., especially salmon aquaculture. There is, of course, shellfish aquaculture as well. There are polarizing views on salmon farms in particular in B.C., and, as you’re probably aware, there is a lot going on with that file.
I’m not in a position to make a judgment on how aquaculture has affected the commercial fishery, if that’s what you’re asking.
Senator Ravalia: I was just wondering if the increased biomass of product as a result of aquaculture has enhanced employment opportunities for people along the coast.
Mr. Frost: Yes, I think it has. The thing with salmon aquaculture in particular is that it’s consistent, and it’s available all year long. Perhaps what makes wild salmon so special — I’m a big proponent of seafood. I think it’s very important to Canadians. As a resource, it is something that should be well managed and transparent. Canadians should be aware of what is happening in fisheries.
Wild seafood is, really, the last of the wild food that we have. Therefore, I think it is very important and very special and should be defended by Canadians.
That’s not to say that aquaculture is a bad thing. It’s just not somewhere I would want to work and spend my career, but it has generated a lot of economic upside for some communities in British Columbia. There are those who are very interested in protecting that economic upside that it brings to some communities in B.C.
Senator Ravalia: Thank you very much.
Senator Surette: Thank you for being with us tonight. As a little bit of background, the discussion regarding the Pacific fisheries came about at this committee while we were looking at the owner-operator and fleet separation policies on the East Coast, and then we thought it would be a great idea to see what is happening on the Pacific Coast. That’s why we’re having the discussion.
My question is going to go toward the owner-operator and fleet separation. We have heard from some witnesses from the Pacific Coast and at the Canadian level that they would like to see a made-in-B.C. approach to something similar to owner-operator and fleet separation.
We also know from Fisheries and Oceans Canada, or DFO, from a news release earlier this year, that there is a West Coast Commercial Fisheries Modernization initiative that talks about strengthening harvester control over fishing activities, enabling harvesters to retain a greater share of the benefits from their efforts and modernizing the licensing regime to better support business planning and adaptation to changing conditions.
My first question is this: Were you or your company aware of and consulted regarding the modernization plan?
Mr. Frost: Yes, I have been involved in some West Coast modernization meetings, along with DFO and other stakeholders, and we have explored different themes.
Ownership has not really been explored in the meetings that I have been invited to. It’s more about sharing arrangements. Modernization of our reporting structures, compliance and monitoring have been the main themes that we have explored.
Senator Surette: — owner-operator and fleet separation as we know it on the East Coast?
Mr. Frost: You were cut off there just at the beginning. Could you repeat that, sir?
Senator Surette: The discussions you were involved in had nothing to do with owner-operator and fleet separation as we know it on the East Coast?
Mr. Frost: I have been involved in some discussion. This has been an ongoing discussion on the West Coast, so I have had a lot of discussion with other stakeholders. But there has been no engagement, basically, on owner-operator modelling or structure in B.C. that I have been invited to.
Senator Surette: Just so I understand a little better, you talked about your salmon quota. You didn’t talk about your herring. From some of what I have seen, the Jim Pattison Group owns approximately 80% of the herring quota, from what I understand, on the Pacific Coast. Is that your group that owns that quota?
Mr. Frost: No, sir. It’s funny; I do read things like that in the newspaper about how much Canfisco owns. It’s not true.
Senator Surette: For your company, on the herring, you mentioned there was a number — 1,000 or whatever the real number is — of gillnetters. Does your company have herring seiners as well?
Mr. Frost: Yes, absolutely, sir. We just had a successful season in the south here.
I could talk a lot about herring. We used to fish in five different areas, from Haida Gwaii to Prince Rupert District, Kitkatla, Big Bay, Central Coast, the west coast of Vancouver Island and the Strait of Georgia.
Herring in B.C. is doing very well, and we have made a lot of headway with the Herring Industry Advisory Board on the herring file and trying to get access to fish where there are fish and where a sustainable harvest could happen.
We have had a really consistent harvest in the Strait of Georgia over many decades, and the biomass in the north is really at peak levels. It’s never been higher.
Yes, we have seines that harvest roe herring and herring for food as well —
Senator Surette: Sorry, I didn’t want to cut you off necessarily, but I was trying to get to the fact that you have your own boats. I don’t know how many herring seiners you have. You fish your own quota. You process your own herring. Then there are a number of independent licence holders, whatever the number is, the gillnetters who don’t have any quota. They have to find quota somewhere to fish. Do they sell to you as well?
Mr. Frost: I’ll tell you how it works for seines. I fished seven seines this season. There were probably about 18 seines that fished for our industry this season. Some of those licences are owned by the company that I work for. Some of them are owned by the fish harvesters who delivered fish to Canfisco.
Our fleet is made up of one wholly owned Canfisco vessel. The other six are partners, joint fisher partners who own a share, perhaps, on the licence, and private vessel owners who own the vessels and own the licences as well. They bring that one licence to us, which in 2026 was worth about 28 tons of herring. That 28 tons will not get you a crew share.
There are over 1,200 gillnet licences in our system. I believe just about 1,100 of them were fished in the Strait of Georgia this year.
I fished 7 herring gillnet pools of which there were probably, I’d say, 18 little punts that would deliver to the motherships. Those are all independent fish harvesters. Most of them open their own licences. Some of them brought as many as 12 or 14 licences to us, and we paid them a lease for those.
We have to supplement their catch, or their quota to catch, with licences that we own or that we have sought out and leased from private licence holders. We provide that quota to our fish harvesters free of charge. We pay the lease on that. We also pay them a lease for their licences.
Senator Surette: As a final clarification question, when you are talking about a licence, are you talking about quota at the same time? Is the quota attached to the licence?
Mr. Frost: Correct.
Senator Surette: Thank you.
Senator Dhillon: Thank you, Mr. Frost, for being here today. I appreciate all the information.
This committee has heard troubling testimony suggesting that illicit financing, including potential money laundering, may be influencing licence quota prices in the Pacific fisheries. Concerns have been raised about opaque ownership structures. We talked about the registry here just now — some intimidation within the sector, a possibility that anonymous or foreign investors may be using the licence market to launder money or distort prices. This concern was raised in the Cullen Commission as well. They certainly raise serious concerns about the transparency and integrity of the fishery.
Could you comment with your thoughts around that and whether illicit financing could be affecting quota values and market dynamics in the Pacific fisheries? I will ask a bunch of questions, and you could comment on them, if you don’t mind.
Are the current ownership disclosure and transparency requirements sufficient to protect the integrity of the system? If not, what additional safeguards do you believe could be put in place? I’ll stop there. I may have a follow-up for you.
Mr. Frost: It’s a lot to unpack. I’m unaware of any — I guess I’ll call it “funny business” within our licensing structure or quotas or intimidation or anything like that with regard to the commercial fishery. The company that I work for and the fish harvesters I work for have relationships that are based on trust. That is a given for me.
With all due respect, sir, I will likely refuse to work with someone I do not trust. I don’t want to work with harvesters I feel are out of compliance or have shady business. That’s really all I can say about that topic.
Senator Dhillon: Thank you, Mr. Frost. I appreciate that. Given your experience and the length of time you’ve spent in the industry, what would you suggest could strengthen the current system? As you say, you don’t know of any, but where would you say are the weak points? What do you suggest could be tools or systems or frameworks that could augment what is in place now to avoid any future perpetration of money laundering or organized crime, so that the kind of safety that we’re enjoying now, as you share it, remains?
Mr. Frost: I don’t really have any comments here for you. I’m unaware of any money laundering or any sort of intimidation or any of the issues you’re bringing up. I can talk about a lot of things that could support our fishery here, but those issues that you’re presenting, I feel, are not part of any issues that I am currently addressing.
Senator Ince: Thank you, Mr. Frost. Thank you for sharing information on the industry with us.
In 2019, the House of Commons issued a report entitled West Coast Fisheries: Sharing Risks and Benefits. It unanimously called for a shift away from the current commercial licence to owner-operator, similar to on the East Coast. Can you explain the benefits you see of maintaining the status quo?
Mr. Frost: Yes. I think that ownership structures are important. As I mentioned, I empathize with the challenges that fish harvesters are facing. In a best-case scenario, the best relationships that I have in the business I work for are partnerships, where we have an owner-operator. Perhaps that person owns the licence, or perhaps we share it. Those are really strong relationships. When people have ownership, they care more. Those are the best-looking boats that we have. They have the greatest housekeeping. They might be the most professional fish harvesters we have, with consistent crews with good earnings.
I really believe in fairness and equity for companies and for fish harvesters. We’re in this together. We need to work together to create equity and fair arrangements for fish harvesters.
I have fought diligently, I feel, for what I feel is right and for fair arrangements. That’s what I’m looking for in the arrangements that I make and in the management decisions that I make for the company that I work for.
Senator Ince: Thank you for that. I’m going to shift a little bit and ask you a question here: What proportion of Canfisco Group’s fishery products are exported out of North America? What would the value of those exports be?
Mr. Frost: Sorry, I’m on the fishing side of our business. My job is to catch fish, to work with commercial fish harvesters, to support them for vessel issues and the landing of fish. I would not be able to tell you the amount of our fish sales that go out of the country. There are some, yes, sir.
Senator Ince: Thank you.
Senator Surette: I will go a little further with my original questions on owner-operator. I am trying to understand a little bit more on the herring.
In your opening remarks, you said there were too many fishers — if I understood properly — too many fishers and too many boats for the amount of fish. There has to be some rationalization. If you take the herring — in this case here, I’m sure you’re talking about the gillnetters in this case, that the 1,100 of them are too many for the amount of fish that’s there and for the quota that they have.
Therefore, they can’t make a living at it, because they don’t have enough quota as independent owners. Am I correct?
Mr. Frost: Yes, partially. There are not 1,100 gillnetters anymore. There are 1,100 licences. These are party-based licences, as we call them, owned by individuals or companies. If I thought about how many work in our fishery, I would probably be guessing, but I would think that there are a few hundred fish harvesters.
Senator Surette: The reason for that is because there’s not enough quota to go around, so they eventually drop out because they can’t make a go at it?
Mr. Frost: The herring fishery used to be very prosperous and used to be multi-areas, as I mentioned, five areas as opposed to down to one or two these days. So we used to have much more opportunity in the fishery, a much longer season and much more quota to catch.
Our herring fishery has been devastated, and the infrastructure that goes along with it cannot be maintained. It is too expensive, basically, to catch herring in some areas and transit it to areas where it could be offloaded and processed. The margins are too skinny.
There used to be 500 seine boats in British Columbia, successfully fishing from about May to November. We’re down to maybe 50 boats — in a season that might begin in July and be all over by September 15 for concerns over steelhead or perhaps Southern Resident killer whales, or SRKWs.
Senator Surette: Some of the witnesses also talked about independent owners having to purchase quota to make a go at it, and they pay up to 80%, some witnesses said, just to buy that quota, so their margins are not going to be very large. Is that to certain specific fisheries or is that across the board?
Mr. Frost: No, that’s definitely to specific fisheries. I was talking to a fish harvester on the weekend, whom I’ve worked with over many years, and we were talking about the geoduck fishery that he participates in. I don’t really know a whole lot about it, but his comment was — much as you have stated — that leases can be up to 80% of the gross revenue paid to a licence holder for quota. This is an unacceptable business practice, in my mind.
Senator Surette: My very last but blunt question is this: For the Canfisco Group, going back to owner-operator is just not realistic, is it?
Mr. Frost: Absolutely it is.
Senator Surette: It is.
Mr. Frost: We want to buy fish. I’d like to support fish harvesters that catch it. I like working with them. I like providing them with support.
If you didn’t have people like me, perhaps, and my staff, I don’t think you could ever go fishing. You’d just be doing paperwork. So fish harvesters need a lot of support to realize a true economic opportunity. On the Atlantic, I’m sure that’s the same. Meeting compliance is not easy.
I want to work with fish harvesters. I want them to be able to support their families and have great careers. I want their sons and daughters to work in the fishery. I want them to want to work in the fishery and to know that there’s something there for succession. We’ve lost too much of that. Canfisco wants to buy fish. How that fish comes to us is — just give us the access. Give the fish harvesters the access that they really need where access exists.
Senator Busson: I’m from B.C., but I’m not from the coast. I actually grew up in Nova Scotia, so I’m a bit of a neophyte about the commercial fishery on the West Coast, although I catch the odd salmon myself in Prince Rupert — my husband and I — but that’s a whole other study.
What I wanted to ask just so I can get my head around how this works in British Columbia, I know the places, Vancouver, Richmond, Prince Rupert and Port Hardy, where you have your processing plants. What if you want to fish in Zeballos or Port McNeill or Ucluelet or Port Ed — Port Ed would be Prince Rupert — how do the fish harvesters that don’t connect somehow to Canfisco operate? I’m just curious to figure this out because there are a lot of places outside the realm of what you described.
Mr. Frost: British Columbia is big and beautiful, with a lot of territory and hundreds of thousands of miles of coastline. Canfisco and other companies do the same thing. If we are fishing in the Prince Rupert region, say, anywhere from Gill Island in the central coast, that fish can go to Prince Rupert or it can go to Port Hardy. Fish harvesters will travel after they have completed a fishery to offload their catch. Fish in Haida Gwaii could be landed in Haida Gwaii or transited back to Port Hardy or to Prince Rupert. Fish caught in the central coast can go to Port McNeill or Port Hardy. Fish caught on the West Coast can go to Tofino or Ucluelet, more likely Ucluelet. Fish harvesters often travel great distances to deliver their catch in B.C.
I’m from Nova Scotia as well and have been in B.C. for 38 years. I have fishing family in Nova Scotia as well.
Senator Busson: Just to close the loop on my questioning around that, again we were talking about the owner-operator regime as it looks on the East Coast. As things move forward, what percentage — I’ll see if I can frame this so it makes some sense to me and hopefully to you — of the quota or the total catch for salmon, herring, and also I understand halibut is a big part of your regime, and hake as well. What percentage of the biomass on the coast in a year do you estimate that your company has either quota for or lease of in the run of a season?
Mr. Frost: Let me start with halibut. I believe that the total allowable catch in B.C. for halibut in 2026 is probably about 3.4 million pounds. Each vessel is actually only allowed to catch 1% of that as a vessel cap in this given year, so about 34,000 pounds would be the maximum any one vessel could catch. If I were to estimate how much of the halibut quota Canfisco owns, it would probably be less than 3%. To finish that off, halibut, yes, is part of our business, just not a big part of our business. It’s very small.
Salmon, at one time, was a very big part of our business. We ran two salmon canneries in B.C. at one time, but those have been shuttered because of the lack of access to resources for different reasons. Our seasons are very short now. Salmon are by and large derby fisheries, so any one licence could go to an open area and catch as much retention species as it wanted, not subject to a quota. There are two quota fisheries in British Columbia: one is on the Fraser, for Fraser sockeye and pinks; the other is on the Skeena for Skeena sockeye. So the rest of the province is open to what we would refer to as a derby fishery, where any one licence holder could catch as much as they can catch, based upon different variables. There could be an allocation for industry and once that industry allocation was caught, then the fishery would close, for instance.
With herring, there is a quota attached to each licence, so each licence is worth whatever the given quota would be for any given season in that area.
If I look at what Canfisco has with respect to herring quotas, I think it would be around 30% of the herring seine quota, and maybe less than about 10% of the herring gillnet quota. That is the licences that Canfisco Group holds. We provide those licences to fish harvesters to fish. There is no lease attached to that, or there hasn’t been a lease attached to that in my tenure.
Senator Busson: Just because I can’t get the ends to meet on this, you’re talking 2%, 10%, 30%, yet you’re the biggest fishing company in British Columbia?
Mr. Frost: We could be. We certainly, at one time, had the biggest fleet in B.C. with the most boats.
Senator Busson: How does that happen? How do you catch 2% of the quota and yet you’re the biggest fishery in British Columbia?
Mr. Frost: There are probably 22 fisheries in B.C. We participate in less than 25% of that.
You mentioned hake. We haven’t had any West Coast hake landings in many years. We participate in groundfish, which is multi-species. I have four vessels that fish what I call a block of halibut, which also has some bycatch, and we fish herring and salmon in B.C.
Senator Busson: You don’t do shrimp or crab or anything like that?
Mr. Frost: We do not.
Senator Busson: Thank you.
Senator Ince: Thank you. Mr. Frost, how would potential changes to the Pacific Coast licence regime affect the international competitiveness of our Canadian fisheries sector?
Mr. Frost: That’s a really strong point you’re making here. We used to compete in a very limited geographical market. Now the way that I believe all fisheries work is we’re all competing in a global market. The changes to the Pacific licensing regime need to be well thought out. They need to be explored by the harvest committees.
Those harvest committee members have been elected by the harvesters themselves. While owner-operator principles that have been successful and are in place in the Atlantic, I think the concerns from people like myself are blanket changes that hope to benefit those they’re intended to benefit. But I really feel like this is a long process that needs to be well thought out, and there are so many other variables and affecting issues that we’re currently facing, like marine protected areas and like reconciliation, that are so important.
There’s a lot of work to be done in B.C. before we can start to alter the licensing regime across the board. There are issues; there’s no question. This is not a perfect system. Some issues that have been identified today need work; there’s no question. This needs to be very thoughtful.
I’ve been around a little while. I’ve seen Fisheries and Oceans Canada make changes. It’s been challenging. Any changes need to be well thought out, fishery by fishery.
Senator Ince: Thank you.
Senator Cuzner: I must ask Mr. Frost where he’s from in Nova Scotia first.
Mr. Frost: My dad was from Argyle, and my mom was from Middle East Pubnico, Nova Scotia. I have a fishing family in District 34 fishing lobsters and we grew up in Cole Harbour.
The Chair: We’re all smiling here.
Mr. Frost: When I was 21, I couldn’t wait to go, and now I can’t wait to get back.
Senator Cuzner: There you go. The issue we’re dealing with, I know, is very complex. The West Coast fishery has evolved over the years and for many different reasons. We know that any fishery must be driven by conservation; that has to be paramount.
One thing that we’ve heard fairly consistently — and we heard it when we spoke with harvesters on the East Coast as well as in B.C. — they said one of the major deterrents is access to capital and it’s a capital-intensive industry. They have advocated for a pool of money or a public source to borrow and to gain that access. Typically, they’re bidding against the Jimmy Pattisons of the world when it comes to quotas. How do you see this impacting the sector if we were to recommend the development of such an agency? How do you see this impacting the cost of licences and impacting the sector?
Mr. Frost: This is a really complex issue. Let me step back. I think that a bank or supporting economic organization or access to capital for fish harvesters would be a fantastic idea. That is something that processors in B.C. have been doing for a long time: providing access to resources, providing vessels, providing licences and providing financing at really competitive rates. That is something that the company I work for does. And it’s something that other companies in B.C. do as well.
So, that sort of access to capital, that affordable financing, it is sort of already in place. It is not that I don’t think that there should be government support or support for independent fish harvesters outside of processors and already existing industries; I think that would be a great idea.
The thing that I caution here is I think what we’ve seen — be careful here — where financing or licences have been made available through government programs to harvesters or certain groups, that is turned around and it has driven up the cost of acquiring quotas and the cost of acquiring licences. The Pacific Integrated Commercial Fisheries Initiative, or PICFI, programs and things like that haven’t always worked in B.C.
You know how much you would have to pay for a pound of halibut quota right now in B.C.? It is around $120 to $130 a pound. So if I wanted to go out and buy enough halibut to go fishing with annually, I would be looking for 50,000 pounds. At $120 to $130 a pound, it’s never going to happen. The return on your investment is never going to be there in your lifetime.
That price has been driven up by programs that have been made available. So it’s an example of how what seems like a good thing can just really be another barrier to entry for a guy who wants to buy it.
Senator Cuzner: If a company is offering financing to an independent harvester to acquire a licence, is there an understanding of indentured servitude that you’re going to have to sell your catch to this processor because he’s not really on his own, or at least until the repayment is complete? Do you do that?
Mr. Frost: Yes, that’s a fair question. If a guy comes to me and says, “I’m really interested in a vessel of my own and some licences, but I don’t have any financing,” the obvious thing to say would be, “We could talk about financing.” As a company who wants to buy fish, yes, absolutely.
Senator Busson: Your perspective is so valuable when it comes to learning about how the fishery works. I’m just going to step away from owner-operator just a little bit.
We had a witness here in the recent past, talking about — you brought it up — the 2025 sockeye salmon run fiasco on the Fraser. I happen to live in the part where all those fish were going at the end of the run. If I understand it, it was such an underestimation that it had a very negative effect on forward harvests of sockeye. It will have an effect over the next few years because of their overrun spawning grounds.
Do you have a suggestion on how DFO could do better at engaging with people who work in the fishery, either at the harvester level or wherever, to not let this happen again? Was there no response to the fact that everybody was seeing millions of fish they didn’t expect? Did you have a comment about that?
Mr. Frost: We could be here all night. I am an appointed Fraser River Panel member, yes. I’m sure you’re probably talking about Dr. Griswold, who was recently invited to comment on this file.
A lot of things went wrong last year. Things are very complex with respect to fish management in B.C.
I’m not exactly sure how to make this as succinct as possible. My view of the situation in 2025 is that we went into the season with a preseason forecast of about 2.4 million sockeye returning. Therefore, a very limited harvest is available. It might support some First Nations food, social and ceremonial uses, or FSC. It might support some of the Aboriginal fisheries exemption allocation to First Nations as well, but a commercial fishery was pretty much off the table.
Fish started to return. The Early Stuarts came back at many, many times their predicted numbers. That fish swam by. Early Summers came back at 200%. Summers came back at astronomical numbers, so much so that people began to start to create initiatives to try to get access.
I’m going to step back and say that the problem with what happened last season is really complex, but if you go into a fishery season planning for 2.4 million sockeye, DFO is very rigid and doesn’t have the agility to respond to unexpected abundance.
We were able to get some access. As I mentioned, seines got 800 sockeye per licence. But when you think about the composition or the management units of Fraser sockeye, there are four primary runs: the Early Stuarts, the Early Summers, the Summers and the Lates. They all overlap. So maybe there is an allocation for Summers, but the Lates are a problem — or the Early Summers are a problem. So then you have a very small window in which you can target the management unit that is abundant while having minimum effect on the management units that are not abundant.
The escapement targets, the initiative to put more fish into the spawning grounds, to rebuild off cycle runs, was a mistake.
Senator Busson: Thank you. I have a very quick question around that: If you have access to all that extra salmon, would the prices go in the toilet? Pardon the pun. Would they go down?
Mr. Frost: It’s just like anything else. You’re right, when you think about the availability of any product and the demand for the product.
There is a tipping point there. It depends on what is happening in Alaska or Russia and other places that also harvest sockeye and pink salmon. Yes, as the market becomes saturated with too much product, you’re going to see a reduction in price. But considering the modest fishery that we had last year and the demand that was in place — not only for sockeye salmon. We probably let 7 million pinks swim by that we could have caught as well. It really is devastating to fish harvesters across B.C.
Senator Busson: Thank you.
Senator Surette: You probably thought nobody would know of Lower East Pubnico in Argyle. I actually grew up in Lower West Pubnico, and I spent most of my adult life in Argyle. So there you go.
Mr. Frost: It’s a small world. My folks are still there.
Senator Surette: My question is this: Where do we go from here? How do we move forward from here? We heard from other witnesses that there could be changes to the Fisheries Act. There could be changes to regulations. There could be an independent commission set up. There is a modernization plan.
Are you part of any movement? A number of associations are working here on the Hill. Are you part of any movement to try to move this forward in a logical, methodical way?
Mr. Frost: Yes. We have had some meetings on fisheries modernization in B.C. I’ve been invited to some of those preliminary meetings to discuss framework on specific initiatives.
How do we move forward? I can really only speak to the fisheries where I work, of course. I have context for the company that I work for and how it is structured. I grew up wearing gumboots. I have spent a lot of my career on fishing boats and transporting vessels, so I have some understanding. That helps me manage. It provides, perhaps, at least a little respect from the guys we’re working with.
How do we move forward? Again, speaking to the fisheries that I know, we could get rid of some of the archaic regulatory policy surrounding salmon licences — for instance, the length of licences, being able to move them, their having to reside on a vessel. You have vessels sinking at the dock here because the licences have to be on a vessel, which is a risk to small-craft harbours. There are so many issues that need to be resolved beyond this ownership issue.
DFO should continue to provide support for fisheries. I can talk a lot about initiatives to support the environment. Whether it is steelhead or coho issues, interior Fraser coho, Southern Resident killer whales, MPAs, access to resources — there are so many issues that could be resolved before anything else needed to happen.
What is really wrong with the Pacific Coast right now is that we are so cautious. We have precautionary measures upon precautionary measures upon precautionary measures. It means that we simply don’t have any access anymore.
Senator Surette: Thank you.
The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Frost, for the engaging conversation and for taking the time to join us here this evening as part of our work. If there is anything, after today, that you think we should be aware of or if you want to enlighten us with regarding our work, please feel free to forward it to our clerk at any time.
(The committee adjourned.)