Update on MPAs
One key take away messages from our last gathering is the desire to be kept informed about marine planning and the progress of the proposed MPAs. While our industry and association representatives have been in what feels like never ending meetings on these topics, the fall is when many active fishers also join the discussions, including myself.
As highlighted by industry reps, the information coming to the fishers is overwhelming and confusing. So my goal here is to break down some information into digestible pieces and to provide a better idea of timeline.
While there are several sites that are being reviewed for MPAs, some are proceeding at faster rates than others. There are four sites that are being “consulted and engaged” on. These are the sites that are likely to be implemented in 2025. They have established advisory boards and the specific rules of what we can and cannot do are being ironed out.
These sites are:
Masset and Skidegate Inlets (implementation planned for 2025)
- These will potentially impact prawn, crab, salmon and the recreational sector.
- Aim to protect species of ecological and cultural importance, including birds, salmon crab and prawn, as well as their habitats.
- DFO’s Fisheries Statistics -
- Skidegate - Very little commercial fishing since 2010
- Masset - <1750 kg/yr for crab in the area, and low levels of Humpback Shrimp fishing.
Homayno (Heydon Loughborough)
- This will potentially impact prawn, crab, salmon and rockfish
- This site aims to protect species of ecological and cultural importance, including crab, prawn, salmon and rockfish, as well as their habitats.
- The site partially overlaps with an RCA
- DFO’s Fisheries Statistics -
- Commercial fisheries for crab, prawn, sea cucumber and potentially rockfish have been occurring in the last ten years. Annual average weight landed is ~2,450kg for crab, ~7,450kg for prawn, and negligible amounts of rockfish.
- Prawn specific information - The original plan would have closed the entire refuge site. This would trigger the Orphan Area Control Rule (DFO doesn’t like to leave a small pocket to fish when all the adjacent areas are closed) The Orphan Rule would required them to close the entire head of the inlet. Because the impact for prawn fishing would be significant, the partners (Wei Wai Kum First Nation & DFO) are recommending to ONLY close the upper half of the refuge site, aligning it with the RCA. By doing this, the Orphan Rule would not be triggered and reduced the impact from 19,300 kg annual catch to 1300 kg annual catch. Please note that this is a recommendation only. The final decision is made higher up the command.
Banks Island
- This will potentially impact sea cucumber, red sea urchin, geoduck, horse clam, prawn, and recreational finfish and invertebrate fisheries.
- This site aims to protect further species of ecological and cultural importance, including seabirds, seals, sea lions, and whales, as well as their habitats.
- DFO indicated they were particularly aiming to protect sponge and coral. The PPFA requested further information on this as current maps do not indicate the presence of sponge or coral in some of the areas identified to be closed.
- DFO’s Fisheries Statistics -
- The level of commercial harvest has been ~ 1100 kg/yr for prawn (0.06 % of coast-wide prawn by trap fishery).
- Dive fisheries have indicated that there will be a substantial impact to their fisheries in the refuge. Statics for those fisheries were not provided within the presentation I received.
Some key messages:
- These sites will be called Marine Refuges.
- Fisheries are considered the primary risk in these areas.
- The refuges are meant to be long term permanent closures.
- The goal is to mitigate impacts from all human resources. This may or may not include Section 35 rights.
- If you have specific knowledge of these areas or concerns, please reach out to your fishery representative. They often do not know where we all fish and have a hard time finding fishers who can given them site specific information.
- We fishers have a lot of knowledge in the areas we fish. Industry is advocating to ensure our knowledge is included and considered in marine planning.
- If you need a contact number for an industry representative, please let us know and we can help make the connection.
- If you would like to see the presentation or a copy of the information sheets I have been provided, please let us know and we can forward them along.
What else do you want to know?
I am happy to continuing sending these updates as the information becomes available to me. Please let me know if there is other information you are looking for. (email bcyfn.steercommittee (at) gmail (dot) com)
Melissa Collier
BCYFN Steering Committee
Docs from DFO:
Homayno MPA Network Action Plan
IFMP MCT Update on Network, Site Establishment, and Site Management, Oct 2024