Hundreds more fishermen in Atlantic Canada are being drawn into the effort to protect endangered right whales this year.
Specially coloured fishing gear rope will become mandatory with the start of the season in every lobster and crab fishery in Eastern Canada. The rope must identify the region, species being fished and individual fishing area.
The requirement is also intended to maintain access to the U.S. seafood market by demonstrating Canada has rules comparable to those in place for fishermen south of the border.
The details were spelled out in a notice to fish harvesters that was issued by the Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) on Dec. 20, and make good on a promise made by the federal government earlier in 2019.
“The new requirements are part of the government of Canada’s continuing efforts to improve tracking of gear, address ghost gear and further identify management measures threats to marine mammals, in particular North Atlantic right whales,” the notice says.
DFO says further management measures to protect the right whale will be announced in the coming weeks.
Why this is happening
The United States Marine Mammal Protection Act requires seafood imports to be caught under fishing rules equivalent to whale protection measures in place in the United States.
Brian Guptill, a lobster fisherman on Grand Manan Island, N.B., said it’s all about keeping the border open for Canadian seafood.
“In order to prove that we’re not the problem, gear marking is the solution,” Guptill said.
In this sample of rope for snow crab, the green represents the Quebec region and orange represents the species fished. (Department of Fisheries and Oceans)
The notice spells out the colour schemes to be braided into rope used in all non-tended, fixed-gear fisheries in Eastern Canada. One colour will signify the DFO region, another the species and, for lobster and crab fisheries, a third colour will identify individual fishing areas within each region.
The scheme has been designed to distinguish between Canadian and U.S. fishing gear involved in whale entanglements.
Gear marking will be mandatory for ropes attaching gear to the primary buoy. They are known as vertical lines and are seen as the threat to whales from fishing.
A tracer line — a silver transparent tape inside the full length of rope — will be permitted as an alternative.
The tracer line must identify the country, region, species and fishing area.
Who’s affected?
Mandatory gear marking is already in place for some fisheries in the Gulf of St. Lawrence.
About 150 lobster fishermen on Nova Scotia’s Eastern Shore will be among the first impacted by expanded gear marking when their season opens in April.
“They’re well behind the 8-ball getting to us. There’s some colours involved that we don’t even know the availability of,” said Peter Connors of the Eastern Shore Fisherman’s Protective Association.
A North Atlantic right whale entangled near Cape Cod, Mass. (Center for Coastal Studies/NOAA permit #932-1905)
He said he’s not aware of a single entanglement in his area.
“If they cause some protection, they do some good then. The fishermen will do whatever they can do to comply,” Connors said.
Other fisheries to be impacted
Fourteen fisheries will operate with new colour schemes at some point in 2020.
By landed value, the most significant species affected are lobster and snow crab.
But cod, shrimp and squid trap fisheries, longline and gillnet fisheries are also being assigned mandatory colour schemes.
The interlaced coloured strands must be a minimum of 15 centimetres in length and, at minimum, will be required at the top, middle and bottom of the vertical line, or every 27 metres.
Guptill, also president of the Grand Manan Fishermen’s Association, is resigned to what is coming.
“Any rope that isn’t marked is going to be blamed on Canada or any fishery that it isn’t marking its rope. So you’re damned if you do, damned if you don’t,” he said.
VANCOUVER – Contract negotiations resume today in Vancouver in a labour dispute that has paralyzed container cargo shipping at British Columbia’s ports since Monday.
The BC Maritime Employers Association and International Longshore and Warehouse Union Local 514 are scheduled to meet for the next three days in mediated talks to try to break a deadlock in negotiations.
The union, which represents more than 700 longshore supervisors at ports, including Vancouver, Prince Rupert and Nanaimo, has been without a contract since March last year.
The latest talks come after employers locked out workers in response to what it said was “strike activity” by union members.
The start of the lockout was then followed by several days of no engagement between the two parties, prompting federal Labour Minister Steven MacKinnon to speak with leaders on both sides, asking them to restart talks.
MacKinnon had said that the talks were “progressing at an insufficient pace, indicating a concerning absence of urgency from the parties involved” — a sentiment echoed by several business groups across Canada.
In a joint letter, more than 100 organizations, including the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, Business Council of Canada and associations representing industries from automotive and fertilizer to retail and mining, urged the government to do whatever it takes to end the work stoppage.
“While we acknowledge efforts to continue with mediation, parties have not been able to come to a negotiated agreement,” the letter says. “So, the federal government must take decisive action, using every tool at its disposal to resolve this dispute and limit the damage caused by this disruption.
“We simply cannot afford to once again put Canadian businesses at risk, which in turn puts Canadian livelihoods at risk.”
In the meantime, the union says it has filed a complaint to the Canada Industrial Relations Board against the employers, alleging the association threatened to pull existing conditions out of the last contract in direct contact with its members.
“The BCMEA is trying to undermine the union by attempting to turn members against its democratically elected leadership and bargaining committee — despite the fact that the BCMEA knows full well we received a 96 per cent mandate to take job action if needed,” union president Frank Morena said in a statement.
The employers have responded by calling the complaint “another meritless claim,” adding the final offer to the union that includes a 19.2 per cent wage increase over a four-year term remains on the table.
“The final offer has been on the table for over a week and represents a fair and balanced proposal for employees, and if accepted would end this dispute,” the employers’ statement says. “The offer does not require any concessions from the union.”
The union says the offer does not address the key issue of staffing requirement at the terminals as the port introduces more automation to cargo loading and unloading, which could potentially require fewer workers to operate than older systems.
The Port of Vancouver is the largest in Canada and has seen a number of labour disruptions, including two instances involving the rail and grain storage sectors earlier this year.
A 13-day strike by another group of workers at the port last year resulted in the disruption of a significant amount of shipping and trade.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 9, 2024.
The Royal Canadian Legion says a new partnership with e-commerce giant Amazon is helping boost its veterans’ fund, and will hopefully expand its donor base in the digital world.
Since the Oct. 25 launch of its Amazon.ca storefront, the legion says it has received nearly 10,000 orders for poppies.
Online shoppers can order lapel poppies on Amazon in exchange for donations or buy items such as “We Remember” lawn signs, Remembrance Day pins and other accessories, with all proceeds going to the legion’s Poppy Trust Fund for Canadian veterans and their families.
Nujma Bond, the legion’s national spokesperson, said the organization sees this move as keeping up with modern purchasing habits.
“As the world around us evolves we have been looking at different ways to distribute poppies and to make it easier for people to access them,” she said in an interview.
“This is definitely a way to reach a wider number of Canadians of all ages. And certainly younger Canadians are much more active on the web, on social media in general, so we’re also engaging in that way.”
Al Plume, a member of a legion branch in Trenton, Ont., said the online store can also help with outreach to veterans who are far from home.
“For veterans that are overseas and are away, (or) can’t get to a store they can order them online, it’s Amazon.” Plume said.
Plume spent 35 years in the military with the Royal Engineers, and retired eight years ago. He said making sure veterans are looked after is his passion.
“I’ve seen the struggles that our veterans have had with Veterans Affairs … and that’s why I got involved, with making sure that the people get to them and help the veterans with their paperwork.”
But the message about the Amazon storefront didn’t appear to reach all of the legion’s locations, with volunteers at Branch 179 on Vancouver’s Commercial Drive saying they hadn’t heard about the online push.
Holly Paddon, the branch’s poppy campaign co-ordinator and bartender, said the Amazon partnership never came up in meetings with other legion volunteers and officials.
“I work at the legion, I work with the Vancouver poppy office and I go to the meetings for the Vancouver poppy campaign — which includes all the legions in Vancouver — and not once has this been mentioned,” she said.
Paddon said the initiative is a great idea, but she would like to have known more about it.
The legion also sells a larger collection of items at poppystore.ca.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 9, 2024.
