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MPs, ITK take aim at BFC

“The ocean floor is being destroyed by net dragging”

JIM BELL

Click to enlarge
These before-and-after underwater photographs show what bottom-trawling does to the ocean floor. (PHOTO COURTESY OF THE NATTIVAK HTA)

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Those questions are about continued opposition to the BFC in some Baffin communities, allegations that “foreigners” are using the BFC to grab Canadian fish, and new allegations of environmentally destructive fishing practices.

Jose Kusugak, president of the Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, weighed in earlier this month when he denounced the method the BFC uses to catch most of its fish — net dragging.

“This is something that threatens once again to desecrate our economy and way of life. The ocean floor is being destroyed by net dragging,” Kusugak told ITK’s board late last month, referring to fishing practices in divison OA, where only the BFC is allowed to fish right now.

Kusugak made similar comments at Nunavut Tunngavik Inc.’s general meeting in Rankin Inlet this month.

Ben Kovic, who started a new job as president of the BFC this past Monday, said he was surprised to hear Kusugak’s comments.

“Why would ITK do that?” Kovic asked, suggesting that the ITK president is over-reacting to lobbying efforts by members of the Nattivak Hunters and Trappers Association in Qikiqtarjuaq, a group that’s broken away from the BFC to develop a community-based fishery.

Until recently, Kovic was chair of the Nunavut Wildlife Management Board, the organization that recommended BFC get all of Nunavut’s allocation in division 0A.

Kovic resigned as NWMB chair recently to take on his new job as BFC president. Jerry Ward will continue as BFC’s CEO.

Sometimes called “otter trawls,” dragger nets are held down to the ocean floor by weights. The mouth of the net is held open by floats. Fishing trawlers looking for turbot, cod and other bottom-dwelling species operate such nets by dragging them along the ocean floor.

Critics say this method snares too many small, young fish, especially in northern Davis Strait, or division 0A. Some scientists believe 0A is a “nursery” area where young turbot hatch and then migrate to other areas, such as division 0B.

Environmentalists also say dragger nets disrupt the seabed and leave the ocean floor in a lifeless state, with no vegetation or fish.

The United Nations general assembly is expected to table a resolution this month aimed at limiting the use of dragger nets in international waters. Geoff Regan, the federal minister of Fisheries and Oceans, was in New York this week to give a speech on the issue.

Meanwhile, the House of Commons standing committee on fisheries and oceans has decided to launch a “study” that will take a hard look at the BFC and its turbot quota in Davis Strait.

“When you rape and pillage the nursery of a fish-stock, you’re destroying the future economy for everybody... Why would they be doing it unless somebody wants to get rich quick? There’s no doubt we’ll be looking into that,” said Peter Stoffer, an NDP MP from Nova Scotia who is vice-chair of the committee.

Inuit fishermen who worked last summer aboard the MV Inuksuk, a BFC boat, told Nunatsiaq News that the vessel bottom-trawled for turbot for the entire time they were at sea. The Inuksuk is a Canadianized factory-freezer trawler that the BFC intends to buy in two years’ time from the Greenlandic, Icelandic and Canadian partnership that owns it.

The Inuit fishermen do not want their names published because, they say, they were “ordered not to talk to the media.”

This contradicts statements made by John Efford, the Liberal government’s political minister for Newfoundland, who defended the BFC this past summer by saying the Inuksuk will use environmentally friendly hook-and-line fishing techniques.

This is what Efford told a reporter in Iqaluit on July 19: “What’s happening here with the Baffin Fisheries Coalition is they are moving towards two things: number one, catching their own fish with their own ship, and with the proper type of conservation gear — hook and line.”

Members of Nattivak HTA were in Ottawa to do more lobbying this week, including meeting with members of the Commons fisheries committee, and could not be reached for comment.

Nattivak is demanding a share of the 4,000-tonne turbot allocation that the BFC now enjoys in northern Davis Strait. Since 2001, when the federal government opened up the area, the NWMB has given 100 per cent of the quota to BFC.

Stoffer also said the Commons fisheries committee will probe the controversial arrangement that saw the MV Inuksuk re-flagged, re-named, and put under the ownership of a Canadian-based company called Nattanaq.

“This deal does not pass the smell test,” Stoffer said.

Ben Kovic said the MV Inuksuk, and other boats hired by the BFC, will continue to fish in Davis Strait until Dec. 31.

“They’ve had some mechanical problems here and there, but overall, they’re doing very well,” Kovic said, saying it looks as if the BFC will be able to catch its entire allocation this year.

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