- Can you just talk a little bit about what type of work goes in the audits and why Oceanic Canada is taking upon itself to do these audits? - We first started doing these audits in 2017, right when we were getting started up in Canada because the answer to how our fisheries were doing was very unclear and there wasn't really this kind of collated data set available. So we set up to do it ourselves. Last year we had less than a third of Canadian fish populations assessed as healthy. And this year we have just over a third of British populations assessed as healthy as a 35% in that zone. Second biggest category would be the level of stocks that are in this uncertain status. So they don't have defined benchmarks to assess whether they are being a fish that's sustainable levels and that's at 34.5%. So very close to the same amount as healthy. And then the rest are in depleted categories. So 13% in the cautious zone and 17% in the critically depleted zone. - Hey everybody, welcome back to another exciting episode of the How to Protect the Ocean Podcast. I'm your host, Andrew Lewin. And this is the podcast where you find out what's happening with the ocean, how you can speak up for the ocean and what you can do to live for a better ocean by taking action. And this is the place, if you haven't been here before, this is the place where you find out what's happening with ocean news, with how you can campaign for oceans and speak up for oceans, and what you can do to take action on making the oceans better in your backyard as well as in your oceans, in your country, internationally, wherever you want it. Go to speakupforblue.com to find out more information, more podcasts, more YouTube videos. You can find it there. You can also get all that information going to your inbox or coming into your inbox by going to speakupforblue.com/newsletter, Monday to Friday at 8 a.m. Eastern, you will get an email to your inbox to be able to find out everything you need to know about the oceans. Today we're gonna be focusing on the eight annual fisheries audit from Oceania Canada. Fishery scientist Rebecca Skines is here to talk about the audit. Go through some of the great points that she sees and what she likes about this year's audit and what the movement that's been made since last year, and also some of the low points that we've seen, some bad decisions regarding capelin and cod stocks and increasing those quotas and allowing offshore to increase those quota and fisheries to continue to happen. We're gonna talk a little bit about a lawsuit that's happening because of that decision, and why that decision was happening, it sounds like it's more at the political level than it is at the public service level. And so we're gonna talk a lot about that and sort of the different levels and why finding out more and getting more information on the uncertain category for fisheries stocks is really helpful even if you get a critical designation to that fisheries. It's always nice to be able to rebuild those, to be able to find out what we need to rebuild them 'cause the faster we rebuild them, the faster they get better is really what it comes down to. So let's move forward with the interview, with Rebecca Skines from Oceania Canada Fisheries Scientist. She's gonna talk about this eighth annual fisheries audit from Oceania Canada. Enjoy the interview and I will talk to you after. Hey, Rebecca, welcome back to the How to Protect the Ocean podcast. Are you ready to talk about the health status of Canada's fisheries? - I always am, happy to be here today. - I love it, I love it. It's great to have you back here. Today we're gonna get into some of the overall statistics that you guys take, the indicators that you take from Oceania Canada to discuss where are our fisheries, where's the health of our fisheries here in Canada? It's been a wild ride over the last three decades, let's just say, or even four or five decades, with the collapse of cod in the '90s and trying to rebuild stocks. And then I guess in the mid 2000s, we started to see a decrease in the amount of data that was collected and just the amount of people that were present in the government for stock assessment collation and looking at data analysis and so forth. And then Oceania Canada has come through and has done these fishery audits, these fish stocks audits for quite some time now. So we're gonna talk about this year's report is just released. I believe end of September, beginning of October. - Oh, we just released it two days ago. - Two days ago, there we go, sorry. I've been seeing news on it and like a little update. So I'm sorry, my apologies. So just a couple of days ago. So this is great. So we're getting the word out just as it's released. And I'll put a link so that people can download the report. It'll be on Oceania Canada's website. But before we get into all that fun stuff and there's a lot of updates on the cod fishery as well, let's just, can you just remind the audience of who you are and what you do. - Absolutely. And happy World Fisheries Day today. - Yes, indeed. - Happy to be here. Rebecca Skines, I'm a fishery scientist with Oceania Canada. And Oceania Canada is a science-based conservation organization and we're focused on tackling some of the ocean's biggest threats, looking to strengthen national policies that rebuild abundance in our oceans. - Gotcha. - Yeah, we had you on last year to talk about this audit. And so let's start from where we left off, just to kind of give people an update. So last year, we had similar results to this year, but can you just kind of just let us know, in terms of an overview of healthy status of certain stocks, critical status of certain stocks, cautious level, and then the big one for me was uncertainty. Can you just kind of give us an update of where we were last year? - Sure, so last year we had less than a third of Canadian fish populations assessed as healthy. And this year we have just over a third of fish populations assessed as healthy, as that's 35% in that zone. Second biggest category would be the level of stocks that are in this uncertain status, so they don't have defined benchmarks to assess whether they are being, you know, fish that's sustainable levels. And that's at 34.5%, so very close to the same amount as healthy. And then the rest are in depleted categories. So 13% in the cautious zone, and 17% in the critically depleted zone. So anything in the critical zone is where serious harm is occurring to that fish population, and really kind of impacting their ability to reproduce and rebound. And that's a level where there's a legal trigger to create a rebuilding plan and get the stock back on track and managed to grow towards healthy levels. Gotcha. Let's give the people just a little bit of knowledge on the audit itself. So you're doing this audit because you want to make sure the government is following the plans from the Fisheries Act to ensure that our stocks, our fishery stocks, are managed properly. Can you just talk a little bit about what type of work goes in the audits and why Oceanic Canada is taking upon itself to do these audits? - Yeah, we first started doing these audits in 2017, right when we were getting started up in Canada, because the answer to how our fisheries were doing was very unclear, and there wasn't really this kind of collated dataset available. So we set out to do it ourselves and looked through all of the publicly available government documents. We're looking at stock assessments, management plans, science reports, and bringing it all together in one spreadsheet, identified indicators of success across management, science data and information, as well as monitoring coverage. And that's kind of define the indicators we've been tracking over the past eight years. So every year I dive into the reports once again, look at all of the newly published materials and update those indicators and start that process in the spring and then all of that gets, we send it back to the department to verify and offer briefings to go over the data and make sure we're accurately reporting everything. And then we write this report, we publish a nice shiny public version and also include all the kind of technical appendices and the spreadsheet for anybody to use. And we've seen a lot of people use the data to come up with their own research and it's been really encouraging to see both the use of that data and kind of the recommendations that we've been putting forward finds their way into changes into fisheries management. - Does the government put out their own reports on each stock? Like do they have their own technical, I know they have like a technical series, do they do like an annual report for all the different fishery stocks every year? - So that's something that they started doing after we started doing this audit. They started putting out a survey of fisheries. It's not as comprehensive as our data set, but we definitely use that to feed into ours. So they look and they've been kind of adding stocks that they've been tracking across their kind of reporting, but you can't really assess the trends as well. And there isn't a report to Parliament, which is something we'd really like to see the government kind of having a self-accountability to Parliament and to report on the state of fish stocks in Canada. - Yeah, that sounds, I mean, that makes common sense, right? Having that to go back to the government, government can look at this, make their assessment and go back and try and improve the fisheries if they need to. - Do you think, and it may not be directly, could be directly, do you think that the Oceanic Canada's fisheries audit is put on pressure for the government to put out their own stock assessment reports for each one? Like, do you think that the Oceanic had that direct influence? - I think it was a contributing factor. I would like to believe so. And, you know, we do get a lot, this audit is well received. - Yeah. - And the recommendations are, you know, we do meet with the department across every region in Canada and in national headquarters in Ottawa to review the findings and our recommendations. So we have seen some of those recommendations taken up directly, including, you know, more transparency, more accountability, more data and reporting over the years. And even more recently in last year, the office of the auditor general put out a report directly on the department's performance on fisheries monitoring, which is something we've been kind of echoing through our audit as well over the past eight years. So there's been a lot more of this type of accountability on the department, but really what we're seeing now is, you know, we're on the right path, but really the pace needs to really pick up in order to meet the commitments that we've been tracking over the years. - Yeah. And I want to reiterate too is, and we had you on last year to talk about this as well, but Ocean of Canada has a very good working relationship with the DFO scientists who are doing the style. Like you guys are working together, you're getting the data, but you also, as an organization, put us a little pressure to be like, "Hey, this is where we're at right now. "This is where we could be. "Let's try and pick up the, like you, as you mentioned, "pick up the pace a little bit "and let's start to get more of these critical, "is it replenishment plans or rebuilding plans back to, "you know, like faster, let's get the uncertain, "let's get them, you know, let's get knowledge on those, "let's get assessments on those "and make sure that we can get this data." So you kind of have where, as an organization, you wear two hats in this regard. Is that a safe assessment? - Yeah, when I'm involved in reviewing stock assessments, I have my scientist hat on and I come to the table without any biases or, you know, hidden agenda. And then when we're driving these recommendations forward, it's, I'm putting on my advocacy, my scientist advocacy hat. - Yeah. - And, you know, really putting the pressure on and holding them accountable to these commitments. And yes, we've seen, you know, uptake in both improvements in the science, but, and better policies, stronger law, over the past eight years. But the gaps are still very apparent, especially the implementation gap. So, you know, applying these laws, practicing what is being, you know, available in the guidance and, you know, and the law and whatnot. - Yeah, and before we dive deeper into this report, can you just go over, and I think we did this last year too, but just review when the Harper government was in power before the Trudeau government, there was a big slashing of fisheries and science personnel that really kind of put a hindrance on knowing what stock assessments. So we had a little bit of like a data gap or amount of resources. Can you just talk a little bit about that and how you've seen that change since that time? I know you haven't been with Oceana since like, when that happened, but just in terms of like, from an organizational perspective that the, like has it changed to increase the amount of effort and prioritization of the stock assessments? - Yeah, I mean, that was before my time. I've been in this role for three years now. So what I can say is the department is well-resourced to do this work now, and kind of ever since I started this job. And there has been significant investments in both science and there was even $30 million this year. Now allotted to increasing monitoring initiatives and implementing the Fish Stock Provisions and the Fisheries Act. So there is dedicated staff to moving this work forward. - Love it. Okay, good to know. That's good to know. - Let's dive into the actual report. You talked a little bit about some of the overview of the report, like the healthy, the cautious critical and the uncertain. So we know a little bit about those. Let's kind of break it up into sort of the good and not so good in the report. Let's start off with the good. What did you see that was like a positive change or something that you really, some of the things that you really like to see that are trending upwards in terms of better management of these fisheries? - Yeah, good. It's always a great place to start. Happy to talk about good news. Yeah, this year marked two years since rebuilding plans were supposed to be developed for 12 critically depleted stocks. That was kind of mandated in regulations. And we started to see really high quality plans being produced that have a hopeful future for rebuilding stocks such as Mackerel. The plan sets out that Mackerel can be rebuilt within six to nine years. Two cod stocks, Northern Gulf Cod in can be rebuilt within eight years. Southern Newfoundland Cod rebuilt above critical levels within 14 years. And so we've been really encouraged by these plans following the new regulatory requirements. Unfortunately, the plans were not published in time for me to include that in tracking that in the indicators. But we knew that the plans were approved. And since assessing the indicators, we've seen the Mackerel plan and the Southern Newfoundland Cod plan be published. So those are now going to be followed. Those stocks are on the track to success. We've also seen the draft plans for really depleted ground fish in the Gulf of St. Lawrence introduce better measures for mitigating bycatch and a rebuilding plan for high to why Pacific Herring on the West Coast being really a gold standard on how to bring forward both Indigenous knowledge systems and Western science through collaboration with the Haida Nation on this rebuilding plan. So that's been really encouraging and we hope to see more of these plans roll out in the immediate future. Another good, another improvement that we've seen this year is an increase in climate change impacts being included in science documents and advice documents. That has increased steadily over the past years that we've been looking at it. However, there is still a gap in how that's going to be reflected in management decisions. So more information is being brought forward but the management decisions really need to be adaptive to reflect kind of preparing for climate change impacts on some of these most vulnerable stocks. - What, can I just ask before we go on, in terms of climate change impacts, can you just tell the audience like, what types of impacts would we see in Canada that would affect some of these stocks? - Absolutely, climate change is affecting fisheries right now. Fish are moving, waters are warming and changing. Some populations aren't living as long or getting as big. They might not be able to find prey in the same areas or at the same times that they used to. So in terms of managing and preparing the fisheries for these impacts, there needs to be risk included in decisions and management decisions, like where to fish, how long and what amount. So all of that needs to be included in order to be best prepared to adapt to these changes and to be able to secure benefits for fisheries. - Gotcha, okay, sorry to interrupt, you may-- - Yeah, no worries. - Just wanted to make sure you were-- 'Cause sometimes we talk about climate change, we always mention climate change, but then we don't dive into how they're being affected by that. 'Cause a lot of people think of like corals and bleaching and so forth, but we don't think of actual fish getting sort of attacked or getting impeded by climate change. So I appreciate that to go into the details. - Yeah, absolutely, some fish can move and they can follow that the temperatures that they're able to live within and others are more sedentary, stuck in certain areas and you see local depletion happening. And similarly, there's coastal communities in those areas and all of a sudden they can't rely on those local populations of fish for their fisheries to continue. So it's really important to prepare for these changes. We're seeing them now and let alone the kind of ocean changes we're seeing, bigger storms, more kind of destruction of local harbors and whatnot. So, yes, it's really essential to the very least be considering climate change impacts in the way that decisions are happening right now going beyond kind of status quo. - Yeah, and it's nice that they're, like you said, that they're in the rebuilding plan. So they're actually taking them into consideration and that will be, I mean, that will be important 'cause if you don't, then you could be losing out on a lot of things, right? - Absolutely. But yeah, kind of one more highlight, if you will. We have seen an increase in setting some benchmarks. So a slight decrease in the amount of stocks that are in the critical zone. And this is likely driven by the Fisheries Act regulations where if a stock is critical, it gets a rebuilding plan. We looked into these uncertain stocks a number of years ago and assessed that there's very likely more critical and cautious stocks hidden in that category. And so assigning stock status, albeit a very slight shift. It's a shift in the right direction. - Right, right. Now, I'm looking at, which is great. I mean, these are great highlights to see, unfortunately, I wish there were more, but they're a great highlights to see. I'm looking at part of the document here that was published that I'll put that I'll link into the show notes. So it says compared to 2023, there are now, and it says like at reduced risk, 13 more at reduced risk, nine fewer in the cautious zone at reduced and five more critical and then nine fewer. So can you just explain a little bit about that and what that means? - Yeah, definitely. So that's looking from last year to this year. So nine fewer in the uncertain category, that's kind of that shift that I just mentioned. Those stocks got a status. It could be a critical status, cautious or healthy. And we've seen more kind of move into the assigns that they are healthy. And for the critical stocks, that either came from uncertain to critical or something slipped from cautious down to critical. And so that's a concerning increase that we've seen more critical stocks this year than last. - Okay, okay. But I think that's what is really interesting is about the uncertain category, is you could have more that are healthy and you could have some that are in the cautious and some that are in the critical, but at least we're assigning something. And even if they're in the critical, and obviously that's not good. You don't want to see them in the critical, but at least we know they're in the critical. That triggers that rebuilding plan. Then we can start moving as a country, like start managing it properly and hopefully seeing that increase or at least finding out why it's in the critical zone and be able to do that. I think that's a great part. Like we have 34%, I think it's 34.5% in the uncertain. There's a lot there that could be healthy. We just don't know, but they can also be critical and we need to know to make sure that we can get them back up to where they were, which I think is really cool. To just have that, just assign more into categories, I think is really great. So that's a good, I like that. That's a good way forward. Now let's start talking about some of the not so great things. I don't want to say bad, but not so great things, but like we looked at good, now we're looking at bad. What were the things that you didn't like that was revealed in the report? Exactly, yes, on the other side of, we saw a slight shift of stocks in that uncertain category. We have not seen significant change, despite having a policy since 2009, that kind of sets forward how we're supposed to be putting these stocks in stock status categories in order to manage them better. And so that's really concerning, as well as that increase in critical stocks. And we are now at the fifth year of having a modernized fisheries act, that includes those regulations for setting out rebuilding plans. And currently only 30 out of nearly 200 fish stocks have this Fisheries Act apply to them. Wow. Yeah, that act was meant to be kind of rolled out so that these rebuilding plans would be able to be developed because they have to be developed within two years. So that initial priority list of 30 stocks included 12 that were critically depleted. Two years later, we've seen these really high quality rebuilding plans, slowly being rolled out, albeit a lot of them unpublished. But the rest don't have any regulatory requirement applying to them yet. Right now, we've seen a second list of around 65 stocks, including around six in the critical zone, being proposed to be added to the Fisheries Act. But that still leaves almost half of the fish stocks still without a regulatory timeline. So there's been a really slow rollout of what appears to be a very strong rebuilding requirement in the Fisheries Act. And that has ultimately led to huge delays in rebuilding these stocks, huge costs to Canadians, both the governmental burden as well as the cost of the fishing industry and not seeing these stocks rebuilt to healthy and profitable levels. And yeah, this has also led to a lot of kind of inconsistent management decisions because we see stocks that are included in the Fisheries Act getting better decisions that are following the law and others, such as, for example, forage fish like Kapeland, we see continued overfishing on. So we're really calling on the government to pick up the pace and include all these stocks in the Fisheries Act, get these rebuilding plans in place and followed, as well as all the other good qualities that we need in management, which is preparing for climate change, implementing the rights of indigenous peoples, and improving fisheries monitoring. So we went from 30 out of 200 stocks that were actually, I guess they were, they were part of the Fisheries Act, is that correct? - Yeah, they're listed in the Fisheries Act. - List in the Fisheries Act, okay. - For these rebuilding requirements to apply. - Gotcha. - And now there's a rebuilding plan. If it's cautious or healthy, it has to be managed towards healthy. - And then this year there were 60 more that were added, or that will be added, or on a birthday, prepared to be added. - Yeah, they're proposed to be added. So we haven't seen them in the regulations yet. And so we want them to get in there as soon as possible. - And it's interesting 'cause you, when you say that, you almost say it like sarcastically, because you've been working at this for, I know three years, but you've been working as a fishery scientist for longer. And I think you and I can kind of pick up on a little bit of that. You're like, it's proposed, it doesn't mean it's gonna be there. Out of the 60s, do you think all of them will be on there? 'Cause that's sort of what I'm obviously hoping for, but what I get when I hear, oh, there's about 60 more that are being proposed. But it sounds like you're a little worried that not all of them will get proposed. 'Cause there's some that be removed from that, or is there a good likelihood that all of them will be on there? - It's pretty likely that all will be put forward because to get on that initial list, they had to kind of go through a whole other process. But we engaged in the consultation period for that list. We said, keep all 65 stocks on this list, add more. There's some other critical stocks that need to be included, and they need building plans to be triggered. So we put forward kind of a subset of priorities to be considered to be added in this regulation, as well as get a third and final list of all fish stocks included, get that process started. - What's taking them so long? Like, why is it, I know it's government, but what's taking them so long? - Yeah, I mean, there is a lack of urgency on kind of seeing the long-term vision for what healthy fisheries could mean for Canada, kind of inconsistent decisions from fisheries management. It appears we're still kind of stuck in this short-term crisis management way of thinking and applying the law and policies. And yeah, it really kind of a lack of a long-term vision. And what that comes down to is a lack of a plan, and that's where we see things like having a rebuilding plan, really setting the bar higher than what we're doing right now. The status quo is not sufficient. We could really be in a better place, healthier oceans, more profitable fisheries, better prepared against climate change, food security for those who depend on it most. And these types of goals are not currently being reflected in a lot of the fisheries that are being managed right now. - Yeah, it just seems like, I know government always works slow, but it seems like the pace of this with the re, sort of the new Fisheries Act as you mentioned, the Modernized Fisheries Act, and it had a lot to say that was really great. I feel like it's a stronger Fisheries Act after everything that went through in the past where it was kind of stripped down and then rebuilt with the new government that was in with the Trudeau government. That's one of the reasons why they got in was based on this. Now we have all these mandates, we have all these proposed actions and then we can put them together, but the pace just takes so long. And I'm sure you echo my thoughts of just being so frustrated with just the lack of movement on this. I know a lot of DFO scientists and that they're fantastic scientists that would probably want to see the pace picked up. Where is the level where, can you say like where it slows down? Is it at the top? I know we've had like, we were talking about this before, we recorded where there's been six ministers and six years for Department of Fisheries and Oceans. That can't be helping with the pace, but where in that sort of chain of command does it get slowed down? - Yeah, like you said, there's a lot of excellent scientists working on the stock assessments and the science advice for managing these stocks and setting up higher standards. And where we're seeing some gaps is in the management. So kind of that mechanism of getting science advice applied in management decisions consistently and following policies and laws. And then of course there's always a slow down in the bureaucracy when it comes to developing and implementing regulations. And the kind of other priorities come into focus and shift kind of rebuilding to the side. And so that's where kind of ministerial leadership comes in. It's part of the minister's mandate. This is the same, it's a different minister, but it's the same mandate actually to implement the Fisheries Act for all stocks. And so, you know, all the direction is there what we need is stronger. Leadership and follow through. - Yeah, 'cause even like the people who are in charge of the policy and managing the Fisheries, not just the scientists and the stock assessment people, but everybody else within that chain of command. I know they're gung-ho with trying to get these plans implemented. They work really hard. And as a citizen, not just sticking out of my science and conservation sort of role here, I would like to see it, you know, better managing. And just like you mentioned, the pace to get these plans in place and actually not just set, but implemented to make sure that they go forward. I know the scorecard and the audit kind of tracks that. But how do we as citizens keep up to date on how the government is doing aside? Like during the year while you're collating all this information, how do we keep up to date on what's happening and some of the decisions that are happening and so that we don't just, I mean, obviously the audit is really handy, but so we can see it through and put pressure where we need to put pressure as citizens. - Yeah, I mean, we as an organization participate in the advisory committees for a number of these more concerning stocks, as well as the kind of science processes. It depends on, you know, your interests and your skill sets, of course. If you're kind of more academically inclined, you can dive into the data and share research, share this information. If you kind of lie more in kind of the advocacy camp, we have a whole bunch of actions that would really support this work, including, you know, sharing your voice or perspectives, writing, we have petitions that can be put forward, letters to the minister, letters to the fisheries management, when these decisions are being kind of considered, which for a lot of these stocks happens in the spring. And we try and keep the public engaged as much as we can. We publish all of our letters of recommendation for setting harvest levels and, you know, before the fisheries decisions are made. And yeah, there's a lot that can be done beyond taking a look at our beautiful audits. - And it is great. Like, I think people should read this, not only just as Canadians, but as people who are interested in how it works, how everything works in terms of the different levels, like the healthy, cautious, critical, so uncertain, in terms of how climate change is put into place. There's a lot of information that goes into this audit that I feel is not only good for a scientist, but also for the general public. And I feel like everybody should be involved in this. It doesn't matter where you live across the country. This is something that should be about, even if you're in the US, 'cause, you know, a lot of times we share fish stocks of some sort, you know, fish don't see borders and so forth. So I think it's important to be able to see that. And we have similar, you know, management practices that we take care of. So I think that's always great. I wanna take, I know, you know, we talked about the other's 200 fishery stocks, and we can't talk about them all in, you know, in this interview, obviously. But I wanted to just revisit, you were on the podcast earlier this year to talk about the meetings that you attended for the cod fisheries and the Caplan fisheries, which are very closely related. Can you just talk about the results of those meetings, what happened in our disappointment with it? Not just no spoiler, but in our disappointment with it. - Sure, so I guess maybe two years back, well, cod have been kind of known to be critically depleted, collapsed, you know, since the '90s, similar timeframe for the Caplan fishery. And that was a stock, the Caplan stock was in that uncertain category. And we had done an assessment that suggested that it was in the critical zone. And sure enough, a DFO assessed it as well as in the critical zone. More recently, the assessment for cod kind of brought forward an ecosystem approach and used a longer time series and the link that cod need Caplan to grow and to thrive. So it established kind of that predator-pray connection. And surprisingly, what that led to was a lowering of the limit reference point. And so while there's still really low amount of cod and Caplan in the water, both were reassesses in the cautious zone, but-- - And not the critical, it was cautious, not critical. Okay, so they went out. - But they were, you know, they are projected to decline and that's mainly because there's not enough Caplan for cod to grow. So there's just enough for cod to kind of be in that cautious zone, but it's flatlined since 2016. And it's projected to decline because Caplan are also not doing well. And what that led to was really an interesting kind of discussion on reopening the fishery despite there being, you know, the same amount of fish in the water, but kind of that reassessment led a lot of folks from industry and specifically the offshore industry in Newfoundland and Labrador to advocate for a reopening of the commercial fishery. And similarly, the inshore fishery requesting an increase in the quota. And what ultimately ended up happening was just that, the commercial fishery for cod after 30 years of being closed, albeit there still have been a fishery existing on that stock for a number of years at pretty higher levels. But the commercial fishery was reopened and the quota was increased. This has led to, you know, more risk of and quicker kind of decline of both of these stocks to the critical zone. And really seen as kind of premature and irresponsible management, not following the intent of the Fisheries Act, overriding science advice and not following the department's own advice to maintain a closure and to not increase the quota on that stock. - So in the fish, so sorry, I didn't interrupt. Like when they're in the cautious zone, say both for Caplan and Cod, in the Fisheries Act, does it say that they're not supposed to increase or open up a fishery? Is it supposed to stay closed when they're in those two zones, the critical or cautious? - There's no language directly like that, but it is that any decision must minimize the risk of decline. And what we saw was the decision took the highest risk of decline and, you know, really a short-term outlook of reopening the fishery for one year. And, you know, it might be back in the critical zone again in two to three years, triggering every building plan. What was also really concerning was this decision was made without any long-term plan, any target, any goals. And so that kind of doubles down on the kind of irresponsible nature of that decision and really short-sightedness of, you know, where we could be with Cod, which is at a rebuilt level, could provide 16 times more jobs. And five times the economic revenue. And similarly with Capelyn, this is a fishery that's nearly 15,000 tons a year, has never been closed in recent years. And it's a critical forage fish, for not just Cod, but for whales, for seabirds, for other marine mammals, for other large predatory fish that have profitable fisheries. And so really honing in on efforts on ensuring there's enough Capelyn for not just Cod, but for the whole marine ecosystem and all the fisheries that depend on them. - It just, to me, and it just made no sense for that decision. As you mentioned, you've already made the case for it by far, you know, cautious zone for both of them, doesn't say anything in the fisheries act to reopen them. You know, the management plans, don't say anything to reopen them. Was this sort of all those cases like that, you could put forth to say, let's keep it closed or let's keep it at the levels that they're at, maybe even a case to reduce some of it, just to make sure, because we know the levels of growth are predicted to be stagnant. Was this just overridden by the minister, or were there other people within DFO of the fisheries and oceans talking about overriding it? - It appears to be a matter of ministerial discretion, because there's actually been a court case filed now, and we've started to see some of the documents that went to the minister, most notably from the deputy minister herself, recommending that the fishery remain closed and that there be no increase in the quota for a number of reasons. And the decision to reopen it didn't come with very strong evidence. We'll see what happens with the court case, which is taking place early 2025. And similarly, the decision will be revisited again in the spring. And so, what we really want to move forward on better management for both of these talks, is to get out of this crisis management, kind of reactive decision making, set forward a plan, have some clear goals to work towards, ensure that it's ecosystem focus, that we are restoring these links in the ecosystem, so that there's enough healthy, capable, and enough COD getting to healthy levels, so that there can be long-term sustainable fisheries in place. - Yeah, I mean, I'm glad there's a court case brought forward. I'm sure Oceania is following it. Who brought forward the court case? Was it a collaboration of a number of NGOs or how'd that get brought forward? - No, there's, there's a, you know, another, yet another issue that the fishing, the inshore fisheries union sees, which is that they had a commitment to the first 115,000 tons of the fishery. So by reopening it and allowing offshore and foreign access to the COD stop that that kind of overrides that commitment, so that they brought forward the court case, but of course, you know, the decision itself will be interrogated in that respect. - How frustrating is it for you and your colleagues to see a fisheries act, modernized fisheries act to be put forward, everything that sounds great in the act, having, you know, rebuilding plans, putting those forward, seeing things in the cautious, like having those levels and, you know, management acts based on that, and then having one or two people override all of those and just say, no, no, you know what, we're gonna open it. - How does that make you feel as a scientist and as someone froshanna Canada, like working to make sure that we manage these stocks properly and then seeing that happen? - Yeah, I mean, it fuels me. I see the issues so blatantly. There needs to be more accountability, more transparency in the decision-making, more inclusivity of, you know, those who both hold rights and who have a stake in the fishery, and so I'm really kind of activated by seeing bad decisions and knowing where we could be. So that's what drives me in trying to solve these problems and move forward, we have the tools, we have strong laws, we have other great examples and policies, great science to leverage. And so it's about kind of, and that's why we focus on kind of the national scale change, but you know, we work regionally as well. Some regions are applying these tools better than others. And so really having a concerted and collaborative effort so that we can see, you know, long-term positive change. - Yeah, absolutely. Let's shift a little bit. I mean, we're kind of on the level of politics. Just, you know, in terms of looking at who the minister is and so forth. Looking ahead over the next year, there's likely to be a federal election to come in. There's, I think it's safe to say there's likely to be a change in the party that's in government. Not saying it's gonna happen, but it could happen. It seems like all the polls are suggesting that the Conservatives could win a majority. Liberals have touted and professed that they are going to be more environmentally friendly. They are going to address climate change and they have put policies forward. Whether they're implementing fast enough as we even discussed today is something that, you know, we each discuss. Conservatives seem less environmentally focused and more focused on taking away some of those policies. You know, the whole "Acts the Tax" campaign and then sort of taking away all of the carbon tax, sort of policies and so forth. How does Oceania Canada, an organization that's dedicated to ensuring that, you know, we can fish forever and properly and sustainably, how does the organization prepare for any government shift when there's a shift in power? I mean, we've had the Liberals in power for the last nine years. You've been working on this for the last three years. How does, has there been discussions internally about, you know, how that will be approached or is it just too early to tell, but if there is a shift in government with what looks to be very different policies towards the environment? - Yeah, that's an important question. And you know, change is always happening, especially at the political level. And so what we're really focused on is trying to kind of depoliticize fisheries management by moving forward with strong laws and regulations so that there's rules that everyone can follow and it's not up to the whims of different leadership because there is a lot of discretion that is afforded to both the minister and those involved in higher levels of politics. So by kind of working at this level and ensuring that there's the laws being applied and followed, that's something that everyone can get behind. Of course, we do have, we offer this, the audit information to both, to all parties. And we did actually have some meetings on these topics and kind of share some of the priorities about rebuilding. You know, we are about more fish, more fishing and how to get there. And that is something that I think a lot of people can get behind and especially as there's increasing threats and impacts from things like climate change and other issues that people care about. So that's kind of where we're at is trying to get as much done as we can with this current government as well as looking forward to enforcing some of these reforms. - Yeah, makes perfect sense. I like the whole depoliticizing fisheries management 'cause that shouldn't matter what political parties and play, we want people to fish. We want it to be sustainable and that's just as easy as it sounds. - Yeah, and there shouldn't be fights and conflicts over every decision, every single year. It's really unproductive and it's not, it's leading to great underperformance in fisheries, businesses and the kind of stability for coastal communities. So we really want to look forward and look to anybody who kind of shares that longer term vision. - Absolutely, Rebecca, this has been such a pleasure to have you back on to be able to talk about this. I want to thank you for you and your team to put in the work that you do to make this wonderful document. I read it every year and I absolutely love it. It really gives me perspective of where we are, where we've been and where we need to go. And it helps me sort of decide the types of content that we're gonna be putting up here on how to protect the ocean podcasts and on our YouTube channel. So I really appreciate you spending the time with us. I know you've probably done a lot of, you're probably doing a lot of media right now to talk about this audit. So I do appreciate you being here and of course you're welcome back anytime to talk about more about fisheries and hopefully we'll be able to talk about more positive things that are happening over the next year. So thank you again, I really appreciate it and looking forward to having you back on. - Thank you. Yeah, I really appreciate being able to share this with your audience and I hope it encourages and activates others as it does to me. - Nice, I love it. Thank you so much. Thank you Rebecca for joining us today and I know you're in a media blitz to talk about the fisheries audit this year. It was just released, it was two days that had been released since when I talked to her and recorded this interview. So I really appreciate you talking to us and you're spending the time with us to explain everything that goes into the audit and some of the highlights and the low points of the audit this year. It seems like we're making some strides. I think it would be great if we made some strides a little faster. Just as Rebecca said, I agree with her there and it's interesting just to hear what's been happening and even though we have a modernized fisheries act, even though we have plans from that fishing act to help guide the management of fisheries notions to manage those stocks better. And then they're not implemented just by one person or a couple people who just say, you know what, we're not gonna do that. We're gonna increase the cod stocks and the capement stocks in terms of the quota and we're gonna make sure that people can fish now even though that will probably go down to the critical level in a couple of years because of that extra pressure of fishing. It seems like we're repeating history over and over again. It could be because we've had six DFO fisheries ministers in six years, I don't know. But something needs to change. Something at that level needs to change, better management. We have to follow the actual plans we put in place because that's what laws are for. That's why we need to do it. And it's interesting to see what will happen with this lawsuit by the Insurance Fisheries Union because they're affected. Because those are really comes down to like the local and our seasonal fishers that will benefit and that'll benefit the communities. You talked about, Rebecca talked about the benefit to local communities that fish and that it could increase by like 16 times and that's a huge increase. And we need to make sure that that continues to happen by making better management decisions, being a little bit more patient and move faster in some of implementing those plans and being a little bit more patient with how the stocks rebuild. Because we don't know how things are gonna be affected from climate change and other disturbances that we've seen in the past. And then we've seen this creeping up and getting worse and worse and worse. So we have to be very conservative from a scientific point of view when it comes to that. So I love at the end when I asked her about like, how do you prepare for a new government? What's gonna happen is depoliticize fisheries management. Can you imagine if we depoliticize climate change and fisheries management and ocean plastic and all that stuff, that would be amazing. I don't know if that could happen but I love sort of the thought process in there and making sure that look, we're just looking out for local communities. We're looking out for the fishing community. We're looking out for the people who benefit, along with, you know, of all the fish processing and the people around there that benefit from that industry. That's what we're looking out for plus for protecting the environment. So there's a lot of win-wins in that situation. And so it becomes really, really important. It's complex, it's not easy. We know that. It's difficult to go through. But I'm really glad that there are people like Rebecca and her team to be able to help out at No Shana Canada as well as other organizations to help out with the fisheries. Really, really great interview. Love having Rebecca on. Love to know what you think about fisheries in Canada and fisheries where you're listening from. If you're not from Canada and you're from the US or you're from England or you're from, you know, Ireland, Scotland, you know, Australia, India, Brazil, we're listening to all over the world. I would love to hear your thoughts on what's happening in your country. Do you have information from your country? I know it's difficult to get information from here if it wasn't for these fisheries on it in Canada but I would love to hear how easy it is to get information. Do you even know what's happening in your fisheries? Love to hear your thoughts. Hit me up on Instagram @how to protect the ocean or you can leave a comment on our YouTube channel. You can also leave a comment on the video for Spotify but I'd love to hear your thoughts on this and we can just, you know, when I start the conversation you continue it. So this is really great. So again, thank you to Rebecca. I wanna thank you for listening, the audience for listening to this episode and all the other episodes you've listened to. Thank you so much for joining us on today's episode of the How to Protect the Ocean podcast. I'm your host, Angel new and have a great day. We'll talk to you next time and happy conservation. (upbeat music) Go, go, go, go, go.
