THE STANDING SENATE COMMITTEE ON FISHERIES AND OCEANS
EVIDENCE
OTTAWA, Tuesday, April 28, 2026
The Standing Senate Committee on Fisheries and Oceans met with videoconference this day at 6:33 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: My name is Fabian Manning, a senator from Newfoundland and Labrador, and I have the pleasure of serving as chair of this committee. Today, we are conducting a meeting of the Standing Senate Committee on Fisheries and Oceans.
Should any technical challenges arise, particularly in relation to interpretation, please signal this to me or to the clerk, and we will work to resolve the issue.
Before we begin, I would like to take a few moments to allow the members of the committee to introduce themselves.
Senator Dhillon: Good evening. Senator Baltej Dhillon, British Columbia.
Senator C. Deacon: Senator Colin Deacon, Nova Scotia.
Senator Prosper: Senator Paul Prosper, Nova Scotia, Mi’kma’ki Territory.
Senator Surette: Senator Allister Surette, Nova Scotia.
[Translation]
Senator Boudreau: Good evening. Victor Boudreau from New Brunswick.
[English]
Senator Busson: Hello. Senator Bev Busson, from British Columbia.
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 from the following individual: Mr. Grant Dovey, Vice President, Harvesting, of the British Columbia Seafood Alliance.
On behalf of the members of the committee, I thank you, Mr. Dovey, for joining us here this evening. I understand that you have some opening remarks. Following the remarks, I’m sure members of the committee will have some questions for you. Mr. Dovey, welcome once again. You have the floor.
Grant Dovey, Vice President, Harvesting, British Columbia Seafood Alliance: Good evening. My name is Grant Dovey, Vice President of Harvesting at the British Columbia Seafood Alliance, and Executive Director of the Underwater Harvesters Association, or UHA, the geoduck harvesters on the West Coast.
The alliance is an umbrella organization whose 24 members represent fisheries, accounting for about 90% of the value of wild seafood from Canada’s Pacific Coast.
Our members are commercial harvester organizations like the UHA, representing most vessel owners from each fishery, as well as seafood processing businesses coast-to-coast-wide.
Licensing policy on the West Coast has been much discussed for the past 10 years, with some interests calling for Atlantic-style policies such owner-operator and fleet separation. Unfortunately, this discussion has been based more on the basis of anecdote than fact.
I want to make four points. First, fisheries and licensing policies evolved very differently on the two coasts. Second, responsible management of stocks and fisheries must be paramount. Third, access is the key issue on the West Coast, not the licensing policy. Fourth, unintended consequences of management measures to address conservation concerns or improve economic prosperity can be mitigated.
First, comparisons between the Atlantic and Pacific coasts ignore the fact that the East Coast has several high-value, high‑volume fisheries that support many participants; the West Coast has no fisheries like that. With respect to my own geoduck fishery, for instance, harvesters harvest 2.8 million pounds — worth about $39 million landed value — down 30% due to Chinese tariffs; lobster harvesters harvest 180 million pounds worth $2.5 billion.
Overcapacity still exists in most fleets, with more licences than fish to support them. Harvesters need several licences to operate profitably and generally participate in several fisheries, some of which take place at the same time, sometimes in different regions of the coast at the same time.
Licences in profitable fisheries are expensive, but that is true on the East Coast too. On our coast, costs have increased because of increased demand and reduced supply.
Second, our policies evolved to improve conservation outcomes. We now rarely exceed total allowable catches, or TACs, whereas in the past we did so routinely. For instance, roughly two thirds of B.C. landings take place under the Commercial Groundfish Integration Program, which integrates seven fisheries, three gear types and 66 stocks. It relies on individual transferable quotas, or ITQs, and leasing to underpin the requirement to account for every fish caught, whether retained or discarded.
On the East Coast, ITQ fisheries are exempt for similar reasons.
Third, changing licensing policy will not solve our real problem, which, as I mentioned before, is decreasing access, largely because of the intersection of marine zoning and reconciliation. It does not matter who owns the licence if there is no access.
For example, the Northern Shelf Bioregion MPA network will reduce commercial access by up to 40% for some species despite the fact that over 35% of B.C. waters are already conserved. My own fishery could lose 32% despite being fully sustainable with each geoduck individually harvested with zero bycatch and no benthic impacts. It is a lack of access that is driving harvesters out of business, not licensing policy.
Fourth, yes, management measures to address conservation concerns or improve economic prosperity have had unintended consequences, but we can address these without upending the way we manage and harvest fish and putting conservation at risk.
Solutions include models such as the sablefish harvest agreement; the shared risks and benefits proposal; establishing a licence and quota registry to improve access to capital and transparency; and encouraging B.C. to establish a harvester loan board, like other fishing provinces.
Lastly, there is one recommendation we would like you to make. We have yet to see any serious work from DFO on how Atlantic-style policies would work in B.C., which fisheries they might apply to, what it would cost DFO to implement and maintain them and how they would preserve the conservation gains of recent decades.
We feel this must be done before any changes are considered.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Dovey.
We will go to our first question from our deputy chair, Senator Busson.
Senator Busson: Thank you very much, Mr. Dovey. It’s interesting to hear your presentation on the way you feel the Pacific coastal fishing industry operates.
I’m hearing the undercurrent of what you are saying, which is sort of, “If it’s not broke, don’t fix it.”
Is that a correct assumption of where you were coming from in your presentation and your approach to what is going on on the Pacific Coast — that there is no comparison with the Atlantic Coast? Is that your position?
Mr. Dovey: Yes, that’s a fair comment: In terms of the licensing regime, if it’s not broke, don’t fix it, for sure.
There is a tremendous amount of uncertainty on the West Coast, as I mentioned, primarily around access and marine protected areas, or MPAs. If we were to deal with that, I think that would go a lot further toward encouraging investment, intergenerational transfer of licences and that type of thing.
Senator Busson: Just to expand on that, the owner-operator and fleet separation regime that exists on the East Coast, we are long past that. Will you confirm that most of the industry is operated by big business on the West Coast?
Mr. Dovey: Most of the industry that I deal with in groundfish and shellfish is fishing families — often multiple fishing families — owning licences. I wouldn’t say it’s mostly big business.
Senator Busson: Maybe I framed that wrong. Could you explain to us how the people who fish the geoduck are part of the process, as you say — if they’re owner-operator, how does that work?
Mr. Dovey: Absolutely. Thanks.
Well, first of all, geoduck is composed of licence holders and quota block holders. There are 55 licences, but there are 550 quota blocks for geoduck. It hasn’t been explained to us how that would work, owner-operator-wise. You can own one or the other or both, and fishing families own quota blocks in multiple regions.
That was done back in 2012 on the advice of the Underwater Harvesters Association in order to increase diversity of ownership. They realized that First Nations were interested in investing in the geoduck fishery and recommended moving from 55 licences with equal quota to 55 licences and 550 quota blocks, and that’s been successful.
As a result, back in 2012, First Nations held about 5% or 6% of the licences and quota, and now the fishery, in 2026, is approaching 30% owned by First Nations commercial fishing enterprises and individual nations through programs like the Pacific Integrated Commercial Fisheries Initiative, or PICFI, and nations investing their Fisheries Resources Reconciliation Agreement funds.
Those have led to a lot of partnerships between nations and non-nations and processors and a lot of success in terms of conservation. It’s managed on a very fine spatial scale. It’s a very sustainable fishery.
Senator Busson: I have one more very quick question: From your estimation of the small fisher owner-operators and the quota blocks attached or not attached to licences, do you feel that’s an efficient way to run the industry, more or less?
Mr. Dovey: I think so. If one of the objectives is diversifying ownership, that’s been a successful made-in-B.C. example.
Senator Busson: Thanks very much.
Senator Surette: Thank you. I’d like to pursue what was just raised a little bit.
I pulled out a report of the BC Seafood Alliance from June 2023, and it said that the number one issue was the lack of access to the resource and not licensing policy, which is what you stated in your opening remarks. Yet we’ve heard from some witnesses from the Pacific Coast and from the B.C. fish harvesters that many B.C. coastal communities are in crisis. While there are many reasons for that, fisheries are at the heart of it, and the focus for many years in B.C. fisheries has been on the state of the resource.
While there are certainly concerns about stock mismanagement, they clearly state here:
It is the licensing system in B.C. that’s responsible for undermining the resilience of B.C.’s small boat and inshore fisheries.
If licensing is not the problem, we’ve heard that for someone who doesn’t have a quota, they can pay up to 80% of what they would earn in revenue just to lease the quota. How can licensing not be a challenge if that’s the case?
To put it another way, if there were owner-operator where they would have their own quota, that’s a big chunk of their revenue that they would keep. I fail to understand how owner-operator wouldn’t be to the advantage of many coastal communities and many of the smaller boats.
Mr. Dovey: Well, you have to go through on a fishery-by-fishery basis. I used geoduck as an example because I am familiar with that. I’ve been working in the geoduck industry for 30 years, and I’m not sure how you would differentiate and deal with the multiple quota blocks and separate licence situations.
We are ready to engage. We’re ready to discuss. If you look at the sablefish fishery, for example, there were concerns about lease prices in that fishery, and so the association put forward the sablefish harvest agreement, which has been similar to what has been proposed for, say, an interim shared risks and benefits proposal.
Essentially, they came up with an enforceable guaranteed percentage to the crew to deal with some of the inequities in some fisheries regarding access to revenue from the catch. A number of fisheries — say, groundfish, hook line or troll fisheries — are integrated, and I’m not sure how you would maintain the high sustainability and some of the Management Strategy Evaluation, or MSE, certifications in those fisheries, which account for two thirds of B.C.’s landings, by going to owner-operator. Those fisheries rely on individual transfer of quotas and trading for sustainability. To account for every fish caught, there is on-ground monitoring, 100% electronic monitoring, or EM, or personal on-ground and dockside monitoring as well.
You can look at an example of a choke species. In the groundfish fishery, you can look at canary rockfish from a few years ago, where we had outstanding recruitment for canaries. There were a lot of canaries on the water, but the stock assessment was outdated, so the quota was very low for canaries. You can picture a 40-foot halibut boat going out for halibut, and, all of a sudden, they run into a number of canary rockfish. If they weren’t able to lease another quota with another boat, they wouldn’t be able to keep fishing for the stock that they’re after.
I guess you have to look at it on a fishery-by-fishery basis.
Senator Surette: I have a short question to finish: Would a made-in-B.C. owner-operator be possible in any of the fisheries, in your opinion? If so, what fisheries would be the most appropriate to begin with?
Mr. Dovey: It would be difficult in any fishery because you’d be unravelling 40 or 50 years of science and management that encouraged harvesters to move to individual transferable quotas, or ITQs, to be able to afford to fund the majority of conservation, dockside management, electronic monitoring and that type of thing.
You would have to go about it on a fishery-by-fishery basis. Right now, for example, there is a process under way where they’re examining the prawn and crab trap fisheries. We’re open to engagement. I think there are a number of prawn and crab fishermen who are looking forward to that process. We would say that you need to make sure all the right people are included: the active harvesters and owners who may have been out and started a fishery years ago but can’t do it anymore. You have to look at it on a fishery-by-fishery basis.
Senator C. Deacon: Thanks for being with us, Mr. Dovey. Explain what you mean by “integrated fishery.” I think I know, but I would like you to tell me. What’s an integrated fishery?
Mr. Dovey: The Commercial Groundfish Integration Program is basically 66 stocks, not as a separate fishery. You can trade quotas, and you need to manage species across the board to ensure that the total allowable sustainable catch isn’t exceeded in all those fisheries combined.
Senator C. Deacon: So you can trade between fishers and licence holders?
Mr. Dovey: Yes.
Senator C. Deacon: Based on what you’re saying, that makes a lot of sense. What about the integration of processors into the industry and processors owning licences? Do you represent both?
Mr. Dovey: Yes. The BC Seafood Alliance does, as well as the Underwater Harvesters Association, the geoduck fishermen. There are a number of processors who also own licences or quotas, usually in partnership with long-time fishermen that they have worked with. These are second- and third-generation Chinese-Canadian processors that worked with and built relationships with fishers from the start of the fishery 40 years ago to develop the cuisine and the export market for those fisheries and often help with funding vessel improvements. The relationship is different on the West Coast. It’s more mutually beneficial.
Senator C. Deacon: So you’re of that opinion in the majority of situations at the very least. I’d love for you to explain what you describe as mutually beneficial. I know what that term means, but how do you see that working? We’ve very much heard the opposite as it relates to that conflict, which you don’t see to the same degree at all on the East Coast.
Mr. Dovey: I can’t speak for every fishery, but usually in geoduck fisheries, as an example, it’s mutually beneficial. We have processors and harvesters on our board. There are different priorities for each member, but, overall, everybody is looking for a successful, sustainable fishery.
Senator C. Deacon: So you’re of the opinion that it is a good thing, that there is an intertwining of that relationship and having processors own licences and leasing them to fishers?
Mr. Dovey: Yeah, on a fishery-by-fishery basis. In my example, it hasn’t been a negative thing. A lot of harvesters and processors have built a relationship over 34 years, and I’m quite happy with that partnership. Unravelling that would be quite difficult. That’s my experience.
Senator C. Deacon: We’re really trying to understand why you think this is beneficial — or I’m trying to. In how many instances do you see these guaranteed revenue agreements that you spoke about a few minutes ago in answering Senator Surette’s questions?
Do you have any studies on the number of processors that rent their licence to a fisher? How many of those have guaranteed revenue-sharing agreements? We haven’t heard that from any other witnesses.
Mr. Dovey: That’s the sablefish harvest agreement. I believe that’s across the board for the sablefish trap fishery. I don’t know the specific statistics for that fishery in terms of licences. I can get back to you on that if you like.
Senator C. Deacon: I have a lot more questions, but I’ll go second round, chair.
Senator Boudreau: Thank you to our witness for being here. In your opening remarks, you finished off by saying you’d like to see options to consider from DFO before any decision is made.
We’ve heard a lot about DFO’s West Coast Commercial Fisheries Modernization initiative. Is that something that you’re familiar with? If so, have you had a chance to participate in any consultations or discussions with regard to this initiative?
Mr. Dovey: Yes, I’ve been to a few modernization meetings or conferences. Something I was frustrated by with the modernization meetings that I attended was that there didn’t seem to be clear goals from the department. Is one goal to reduce the price of licences? Is the goal to increase the diversity of ownership? I think if we had specific goals and more research, we’d be better equipped to make some changes.
Senator Boudreau: I’m just curious how long ago that would have been. Were those kind of one-on-one consultations with your alliance or part of a broader public consultation on the West Coast?
Mr. Dovey: We’ve had modernization representatives attend a number of advisory committee meetings, which are typically in the fall on the West Coast. Then there was a round of open house-type meetings on the island, the Lower Mainland an, Prince Rupert. That was just after COVID, perhaps just as we were getting back into things. So it’s been a number of years since it’s been discussed on the West Coast.
Senator Boudreau: Thank you. Shifting gears, I’m an East Coast senator, and I certainly see a lot of benefits to an owner-operator fleet separation policy like we have on the East Coast. One of those benefits is that the profits, the proceeds, at the end of every fishery, at the end of the season, get reinvested in the communities. It’s there to support the local communities. The owner-operators are reinvesting in their communities. They’re buying local. They’re hiring local. They’re doing a lot of this.
I get the sense from what I’ve heard from past witnesses that’s not quite the case on the B.C. coast, that those profits maybe leave the region and go to corporate shareholders or corporate profits that aren’t necessarily reinvested in the community. How would you respond to that? Is that accurate?
Mr. Dovey: I think we should get some more data on that. I’ve heard that a number of times, yet the foreign ownership studies that I’ve read cite around 5% or 10% for foreign ownership, if that. So if no one is confident in the data and they need to dig deeper into the beneficial ownership of these companies, then I think we should do that.
In my experience, there are all kinds of community benefits from the commercial fishing industry. There are a number of second-, third- and fourth-generation fishers active in the industry, who have lived in the same communities for a number of years and are sitting on boards around the province to ensure what they’re doing is sustainable so their kids can be part of the fishery.
Senator Boudreau: I have one last quick question: The Canadian Independent Fish Harvester’s Federation, which obviously knows the Atlantic policy very well, has recommended a made-in-British Columbia owner-operator policy.
It’s not necessarily taking exactly what exists on the East Coast and taking a cookie-cutter approach, but maybe trying to make more of a made-in-British Columbia owner-operator policy.
I get the sense that your alliance wouldn’t necessarily be in favour of that, but maybe the concern is taking something that exists in Atlantic Canada and dropping it on the West Coast. If there were the opportunity to craft something specific to the West Coast fishery that would ultimately bring that owner-operator fleet separation policy but tailored to the reality of the West Coast, is that something that your alliance would be in favour of?
Mr. Dovey: I think you’d have to look at it on a fishery-by-fishery basis. On the fleet separation, I don’t even really understand it. On the coast in B.C., it’s one province, so there are no adjacency issues. The boats are 65 feet and could be working right off the Fraser or off the west coast of Vancouver Island, so I’m not clear on that.
I would just say we’re ready to engage in fact-based, evidence-based discussions to identify problems and come up with B.C. solutions.
Senator Boudreau: Thank you.
Senator Dhillon: Thank you for being here, Mr. Dovey.
I’m learning about all of this. This is not my strong suit, so I’ll lean on you to help me out with a couple of questions.
You just said that foreign ownership is 5% to 10%. Is that accurate? Am I quoting you properly there?
Mr. Dovey: Those are the numbers I’ve seen in the DFO studies.
Senator Dhillon: Okay. Is that your only source for that information? Because there is no registry. Am I correct?
Mr. Dovey: No, sir. In terms of quota registry, that’s one thing we would like to see: a transparent quota registry.
Senator Dhillon: We don’t have a transparent quota registry, but we believe it’s 5% to 10% foreign ownership?
Mr. Dovey: Yes, according to the study I read. I can send the citation to you after this.
Senator Dhillon: Sure. Thank you. That would be helpful.
The concern this committee has been hearing — and I think you heard my colleagues share with you — is the boots on the boat, a new generation of harvesters coming into the market, the high prices, the costs, all that is, at present, is not exactly making for an industry that’s inviting or allowing a clear path to success. How would you respond to that?
Mr. Dovey: We need more people who are younger than 35 years of age in the industry. I just did my stress test today, running on a treadmill, because I’m over 50 and still a commercial diver and biologist. We can’t keep doing this. We need more young people in the industry, for sure.
The barrier to new entrants, in my opinion, is not around owner-operator; it’s a lack of access to capital and massive uncertainty on the West Coast. We have second- and third‑generation licensing quota holders encouraging their kids to do something else because they don’t see a future on this coast because we’re coming up with 365 separate zones and massive closure areas, from Cape Mudge and Brooks Peninsula to the Alaska border.
How can they invest in an industry if they’re not sure — whoever owns the licence — whether they will have access to continued fishing?
Senator Dhillon: Therein lies the great divide. The struggle that this committee has sort of been seized with is that we have strong sentiment on the part of owner-operators who believe that the issue is having foreign owner-operators and not with the harvesters, not with the boots on the boats. Without that, there’s no clear pathway, exactly as you were sharing, sir, of succession planning, of inviting or of exciting new harvesters and creating career paths.
I guess my question to you is this: How do we resolve that? How do we bring the two sides together in a meaningful conversation or remove some of the suspicion that currently exists? We’ve heard here, and you’ve heard my colleagues say, that, at times, the end result is 20% of the work. I don’t know if any of us would go to work if we knew we were only bringing back 20 cents on the dollar at the end of the day.
How do we resolve those questions? Would you be in favour of a more transparent and clear registry and understanding of where all these owner-operators are, and also questions, research and study around what exactly the end results are and the profits that are being taken by the various parties?
Mr. Dovey: The BC Seafood Alliance has been calling for a transparent quota registry for years. We think it’s a good idea.
Senator Dhillon: I’ll end with one last question.
This is exactly to your point, Mr. Dovey, that if you don’t have young people coming into the industry, there wouldn’t be an industry: In terms of owner-operators and those who hold those licences, what have you folks done to invite, entice or welcome new harvesters into the industry?
Mr. Dovey: A number of the associations have training packages that help sponsor young people who have recommendations from skippers and such to go through the extent of the training you need for Transport Canada, WorkSafeBC, dive certifications, et cetera.
On the First Nations front, we’re very open to inviting a number of the new — the biggest investors in the majority of these fisheries over the past 10 years have been First Nations commercial fishing enterprises, groups like Coastal Nations Fisheries, A-Tlegay Fisheries Society, Gwabalis Fisheries Group, Haida Fisheries, et cetera. We’ve been trying to foster relationships there and get people from those communities out on the vessels as well.
It’s just the nature of our boards. In terms of the nature of my board, I have three second- and third-generation fishing family board members who started fishing with their dad or their grandfather. They’re on our board.
Senator Dhillon: Thank you.
Senator Prosper: Thank you so much, Mr. Dovey, for being here and helping us understand this issue, which can be very complex. There are a couple of things you mentioned during Q&A, if you can provide a bit more detail.
You mentioned First Nation investment being sort of the major portion of investment in the past 10 years. Obviously, you, on behalf of your alliance, are seizing the opportunity and nurturing and creating those investments.
What types of investment ventures are you referring to specifically, for the most part? Which First Nation groups and organizations?
Mr. Dovey: Maybe I can use an example. I don’t think I’ll step on any toes by saying that there’s a fisheries group on the North Island called the Gwabalis Fisheries Group. They represent about four or five different nations on the North Island. They started investing six or seven years ago in one or two quota blocks. Then they started building relationships in the fishery, and now, seven or eight years later, they’ve also invested in a licence, and they’re upwards of seven or so quota blocks in the fishery. They have training programs under way utilizing some funding from the federal government to get young people on board.
That’s a good example of a group of nations working together to invest in the fishery and using those profits to diversify their fishing portfolio and employ people in the industry.
We have a young girl from Alert Bay who participated in the sea cucumber fishery last fall and teamed up with the Gwabalis. She will be coming out on some of the research work that we’re doing this spring on the deck — in the boardroom and on the water.
Senator Prosper: Thank you for that. I think it’s like the canary in the coalmine with respect to the health of a fishery. If you have an aging population, I think you mentioned earlier that you need younger people in the fishery to make it sustainable and viable.
Why do you think there are no younger people? One would imagine that if it’s viable, if you can make a decent living, that people would, in fact, lead the lives of their parents or grandparents. Does it suggest something with respect to the nature of the return from the effort? Could you enlighten me on that?
Mr. Dovey: Sure. I didn’t mean to say there are no young people in the industry, but we need more. I think the biggest barrier to that, as I said, is a lack of access to capital as well as uncertainty. We’ve been wrestling with uncertainty for the past 10 years, and that uncertainty has to do with access and, in particular, the intertwining of marine planning and reconciliation.
Senator Prosper: Can you provide further detail on what that means, marine planning and reconciliation?
Mr. Dovey: Sure. Let’s use the geoduck and the prawn fishery, for example, and the Northern Shelf Bioregion Marine Protected Area Network, which was endorsed by the Minister of Fisheries in February 2023.
What’s on deck there in key regions of the coast where the best fishing is, for example, for geoduck on the central coast, the draft, as it is now, would cut off access to 32% of the landings in that region. For prawns in that same region, the central coast, the draft, as it is now, would cut off access to 42% of the annual landings in that region.
You can understand when you’re looking at investing in a fishery and encouraging your kids to continue in that fishery, once these areas are finalized and enacted, being faced with losing 30% to 40% of your revenue is a pretty tough pill to swallow.
Senator Prosper: Thank you.
Senator Busson: It has been interesting to hear your expert perspective on the West Coast fishery. I have to admit, and I think my colleagues will agree, we’ve been surprised and struck by the differences between the East Coast and the West Coast. I think we thought it was going to be easier than this to try to make the comparison and do what it takes to put some kind of modernization plan to the Pacific Coast.
The first thing that struck me is that it doesn’t seem to be, from your perspective, a combination of whether it’s comparable. It seems to me that it works for you, and that’s fine.
With your expertise and your obvious experience in the Pacific fishery, given that you’ve already suggested that transparency would be a big thing, could you give us one or two other recommendations that you feel would help to nurture the fishery? Clearly, you have that goal. You’re a scientist and an active fisher yourself. What would you suggest to nurture the Pacific fishery? If it isn’t the owner-operator fleet separation model that’s on the Atlantic Coast, could you share what it might be?
It occurs to me that one of the other reasons that it seems that a lot of larger corporations are taking over licences and quotas is they have a bigger risk tolerance to a zone being closed or some other incident happening.
I’d be really interested to hear — if you were in charge of, let’s say, DFO or the model, what would you do?
Mr. Dovey: On the West Coast, especially in times of tight budgets, we’d like to see DFO focus on good science and stock assessment. That’s important for maintaining our MSC certification in a number of fisheries and confidence in our markets.
A lot of people would say that access, access and access are the top three. Without that security of access, some assurances that processes like the Northern Shelf Bioregion aren’t going to cut off 30% to 40% of the catch for key fisheries, it’s hard to move forward. If we could get more certainty there, that would go a long way toward encouraging young people and getting them involved.
Senator Busson: For clarification, you said access to funding was a big thing. I think you’re also saying access to the product — in other words, the seafood in the ocean — is another big issue.
Mr. Dovey: Absolutely. Access to capital is important, but the biggest issue facing the West Coast, in my opinion, is access to catch, access to the grounds.
Senator Busson: Just as an aside, if I might, you talked about sea cucumber, geoduck, canary rockfish and a number of other species. I don’t see any of those in my grocery store. I’m assuming they’re going offshore, which is fine, but who negotiates these markets?
Mr. Dovey: I used those examples, but I’m sure you see salmon, halibut, lingcod and multiple species of rockfish. More and more, you’re seeing dive species, which are typically very popular in Asian markets, like sea cucumber, sea urchin and geoduck.
Circling back, Senator Busson, was your question where the key markets for those are?
Senator Busson: I’m interested if foreign markets are part of a trade agreement or if there are individual producers and people who take the next step after fishing these products. Who looks after this and gets these products offshore to these markets in other places?
Mr. Dovey: It’s a very difficult time right now, with 25% tariffs on products going to China and upcoming negotiations with CUSMA. There’s a lot of uncertainty for people.
For Canadian seafood in general, 80% of the export market is comprised of the U.S. and China. Negotiations are coming up for CUSMA, and, hopefully, seafood stays separate, but there’s still uncertainty there. Other than lobster and crab, all those other species are going to get hit with significant tariffs going to China.
Who develops those? With geoduck, for example, fishermen and exporters or processors have been going to China annually for 30-plus years, just as we attend seafood shows with a number of associations in the Canada Pavilion thanks to agri-food marketing in Europe and North American seafood markets and seafood shows in Boston. We’re constantly out trying to diversify export markets and build domestic consumption as well.
One real success story is the Spot Prawn Festival in B.C. That’s coming up. It will be in False Creek once the fishery opens in mid-May, probably toward the end of May. That has been built into a really popular event. It’s a one-day event, and it flags the product coming in every day to the Lower Mainland. Locals in restaurants are really building on that prawn market, so less of those prawns are going south or overseas.
Senator Busson: Thanks very much.
Senator Surette: Mr. Dovey, I have two questions. I’m trying to understand the lack of access that you’re talking about. If I understood properly, I assume it’s the DFO cutting quotas in certain cases and marine zoning is causing you issues as well. Are those the two main sources when talking about lack of access? Or over time, have there been too many licences for the amount of fish you’re actually allowed to catch now?
Mr. Dovey: The lack of access I’m referring to isn’t DFO in the past 10 years cutting quotas. For the most part, especially with groundfish and shellfish, those fisheries are pretty steady quota-wise.
The lack of access is due to marine planning. We’re starting to see marine refuges, national marine conservation areas and Oceans Act closures come into play. We have mandatory law books and EMs. We know exactly where the catch comes from. When you close off access to those grounds, inevitably, your quota will go down, especially with dive fisheries. Geoducks don’t really swim. They’re in the same spot for a long time. If you lose access, in our experience, you can’t just increase the harvest elsewhere.
Sure, some finfish may swim in and out of the closures, but overall, your quota will go down and your fleet will be concentrated in smaller areas. You will have to travel farther, which increases the carbon footprint, and it’s more expensive to catch the fish.
We’re not opposed to marine planning. We have rolled up our sleeves. I was part of a marine planning team with the BC Seafood Alliance that endeavoured to meet all the ecological conservation priorities yet reduce the impacts on the commercial fishing industry. We’ve put forward a number of slight changes to boundaries and measures to do that, but, unfortunately, despite our best efforts, we haven’t seen real changes in the drafts.
Senator Surette: So that has not actually happened? That’s in planning at the present stage?
Mr. Dovey: A bit of both, senator. There are marine refuges that are being enacted: Hoeya sill, Banks Islands, Howe Sound and Jervis Inlet are on deck and happening as we speak. Then a large number of the other areas are a couple years out.
Senator Surette: Right. The one here you mentioned back in 2023 was the Northern Shelf Bioregion. That’s still in the planning stages, isn’t it?
Mr. Dovey: It is still in the planning stages, but portions of it are being zoned as we speak.
Senator Surette: My second question has to do with the licence and quota registry. What would be the advantage for your members, for example, of such a registry?
Mr. Dovey: It would help deal with the questions around foreign ownership. We’re all open to putting that out in the open. It would help with fishers’ ability to leverage that capital and further invest in the industry.
Senator Surette: If I’m an owner-operator and looking for quotas, would this registry be useful to me? Could I go to the registry and see who has quotas available, then make my pitch to buy quotas? Is that how it would work?
Mr. Dovey: That would be one aspect of it, yes.
Senator Surette: The foreign ownership is a different piece altogether. Would that be for interest purposes? What would you do with the information?
Mr. Dovey: I’m hearing from the committee and others that they’re very concerned about foreign ownership, yet the studies we’ve seen show it’s not as high as the rumours say. Let’s act on facts and not rumours.
Senator Surette: Right. So there are multiple purposes for the registry, then. Some are at the ground level; if I’m an independent fisher, I could use the registry. This would be some other information. Would those be two uses of the registry?
Mr. Dovey: Yes, I would agree with that.
Senator Surette: Thank you.
Senator C. Deacon: Just to finish off what Senator Surette was asking, that was why you’ve been calling for the registry to be created?
Mr. Dovey: Those are two of the reasons, yes.
Senator C. Deacon: Those are two of the reasons. What are the other reasons?
Mr. Dovey: I don’t think I’m explaining it properly, but I think a clear registry would help if a fisher hoped to invest in another fishery to get their kid into the business, that type of thing, and they could clearly show the banks that they’re the owner of a certain quota. A quota registry would help.
Senator C. Deacon: That’s why you’ve been asking for it. Okay. Thank you.
I appreciate you taking our questions. You speak about fishers and about fishers having control, but you don’t see an issue with the conflict of interest between fishers and processors. When processors start to own the quota and fishers have to lease the quota from them, you don’t see that as a conflict of interest that is at all concerning in trying to bring people in? That wasn’t on your list of uncertainties.
I see that, as somebody who has spent a life in business, as enormous uncertainty. That conflict of interest is being challenged from a competition standpoint, but you don’t see that as a point of uncertainty at all. I’m puzzled by that.
Mr. Dovey: In my experience in the geoduck fishery — though you’d have to go on a fishery-by-fishery basis — the relationship between harvesters and processors has been beneficial. It’s helped build strong markets and a sustainable fishery.
I’m sure there are some fisheries with conflicts. It’s not perfect. It’s messy, but you’re competing not just with processors, but other owners as well. There are only so many licences and quota blocks on this coast, as I mentioned before. The majority of fisheries are high-value, low-volume fisheries.
Senator C. Deacon: If you can trade the quota blocks, I just don’t see the issue. You’re stating very clearly that everything is working just fine as it is, with the exception of marine protected areas and a number of different access issues. That’s not what we’re hearing from fishers. For fishers, the access issue is actually to quota.
When you have a conflicted market — which you don’t see right now on the East Coast — and you have the ability to trade quota blocks, which I think is a very innovative element based on all the reasons you’ve given, it’s just not adding up to me what you’re saying, that everything is working just fine and the issue is only access. When you already have an element — if owner-operator were enforced, if fleet separation were enforced, you have the tools right now to provide a lot more certainty. We’re not getting evidence from you; you’re giving an opinion, which is fair enough, that things are working just fine.
Mr. Dovey: Are you saying owner-operator yet still have the ability to trade quota blocks?
Senator C. Deacon: That’s what I heard you say earlier to us.
Mr. Dovey: I thought you were saying the owner-operator would still include the ability to trade quota blocks. If you can’t trade quotas, it makes it difficult to maintain the sustainability gains and allow diversification in the fleet. I don’t understand the question.
Senator C. Deacon: I may have misheard you earlier. I heard you say that those who have quota can trade quota blocks as needed.
Mr. Dovey: Yes, that’s right.
Senator C. Deacon: So, if this were an owner-operator fishery, that is a tool that allows to balance off against a lot of what you have described during your testimony as being within and between different fisheries, and you have a much broader fishery on the West Coast than we do on the East Coast in terms of the types of fish. That provides that ability to balance across a community of fleets, I would think.
Mr. Dovey: How do you call it owner-operator if I can fish other licence holders’ quota by fishing their quota blocks on my boat?
Senator C. Deacon: Between fishers. That’s what you’re describing. Isn’t that what you have described? I’m really getting even more confused.
Mr. Dovey: I think we’re confusing each other. I think being able to trade quota blocks is key for the geoduck fishery and trading quotas is key for the Groundfish Integration Program.
Senator C. Deacon: You’re nodding, Senator Surette. Can you help at all here?
Senator Surette: With owner-operator, as I see it, you have to be on the boat and have your own quota or amount of fish that you can catch and the number of traps that you have. That’s yours. You can’t trade them, no.
Senator C. Deacon: Okay. I understood you to say, Mr. Dovey, that licence holders can trade blocks of their quota to other fishers.
Mr. Dovey: You can lease or trade quota blocks now. I don’t see how you can do that under an owner-operator regime.
Senator C. Deacon: I’ll have to leave it there.
Mr. Dovey: I’m sorry. It sounded like the senator was asking what the problem is with owner-operator then, but the success — look at the groundfish fishery — is the ability to move quotas between boats, and you’re not moving the licence holder with that quota every time you move a quota between boats.
Senator Surette: I don’t know if I can help here. I have to go fishery by fishery somewhat. At home, the owner-operator, the easiest way to understand it is in the lobster fishery. There are a certain number of traps for each fisherman. They have to be on the boat. They can only fish those traps. They can’t do anything else.
At home too, on the East Coast, we have ITQs. When you talk about the groundfish fishery, there the processors are with the boat, and they operate the boat. So they don’t have to be on the boat. You have your own quota in many cases, but you can also purchase quotas in other areas. That’s not owner-operator and fleet separation. So there are two different things.
I’m assuming that’s what you’re making reference to. Am I correct?
Mr. Dovey: That’s a good example. Thank you.
Senator C. Deacon: Good. I got the quota blocks as being the traps on the boat. So, in the area you’ve been traditionally fishing, you could shift a bunch of traps over to somebody else and lease somebody else. That’s what I heard him say.
Senator Surette: I don’t think so.
The Chair: For owner-operator, you don’t do that, no.
Senator C. Deacon: That’s what I heard him say.
The Chair: All right. Thank you very much.
Mr. Dovey, I noticed that in some of your responses, you touched on some reports and different information that you said you could send us later. We would certainly appreciate if you could forward all that to the clerk with regard to some of the questions that the senators asked and some of the information that may be of significance to us as we go forward with our work here. Anything that you think we need to know or have at our disposal to get a clearer picture of exactly what we’re dealing with here, we certainly appreciate you sending that along. I’ll give you the last word, I think. Senator C. Deacon may look for another word, but I’ll give you the last word for now.
Mr. Dovey: Thank you very much. I will send on those references. I appreciate everyone’s time and your interest in the West Coast fishery. As I said, the BC Seafood Alliance and the associations it represents are ready to engage — it needs to be on a fishery-by-fishery basis — and identify the problems and come up with solutions.
The Chair: Thank you.
(The committee adjourned.)