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December 2002
Taking
Care of Business
by Berry Wijdeven
Before George Feltham started his presentation at
the Haida Gwaii Museum, he wanted to make one thing perfectly clear: he
was not a conservationist.
“My job is killing fish,” he
said. “I enjoy fishing, and hunting is probably my favourite
pastime. I‘m certainly concerned about the resource and
willing to do what we can to make sure there‘s a resource
there.” But he wasn’t a conservationist.
It was important for George to get this off his
chest. Like many in his community, George grew up with little regard
for the environment, for preservation, or government. Yet here was a
man who had become the fishing industry representative on Fisheries and
Oceans’ (DFO) steering committee for Marine Protected Areas
(MPAs) in Newfoundland. A man who was touting the benefits of MPAs to
anyone willing to listen. A man who was preaching the gospel of
preservation. What happened?
Blame it on the cod. George grew up in Eastport, a
small village on Bonavista Bay located on the east coast of
Newfoundland. The entire village, the surrounding villages, the entire
bay was dependent on harvesting the sea. Life in these little outport
communities had its ups and downs, its seasonal rhythms. Until 1992.
That’s when the cod ran out.
In desperation local fishers turned to other
fisheries, one of which was harvesting lobsters. Up until 1992, the
lobster fishery was at best a secondary fishery. People generally
caught lobster for two or three weeks until the cod arrived. Now,
everyone with a license started fishing for the entire 16-week lobster
season. Lobster catches went from accounting for less than 20 percent
of people’s income to 60 or 70 percent.
People were maximizing their licenses, maximizing
their effort. Just about every lobster caught was retained. Poaching
was a fact of life and it was perfectly acceptable to bring in
undersized lobsters. Deep down, fishers knew that their practices were
harmful and that harvest levels were not sustainable, but for many the
lobster fishery was all they had left, their only way to make a buck.
It didn’t take long for the lobster
fishery to collapse. In 1993, Bonavista Bay experienced the lowest
lobster landings ever. After the loss of the cod just the year before,
this came as a wake up call. Something had to be done. With the fate of
their livelihoods and communities in the balance, the fishermen in the
Bay decided to take control of their future.
The first step was to create a sense of community
ownership. The seven communities in Bonavista Bay came together and
marked off an area of the Bay where they would take responsibility. A
zone in which they would manage the lobster stocks.
The communities then identified and petitioned DFO
to completely close off two areas within this zone. Two prime lobster
areas. The areas were small, approximately two square kilometers, but
they were carefully chosen using local knowledge. DFO scientists and
university biologists were asked to verify the importance of these
lobster grounds, for the communities were attempting a careful
balancing act: Set aside a large enough area to give the lobster stock
a real opportunity to stage a comeback yet don’t unduly
impact the income of the fishers who were already struggling to make a
living.
The goal of the closed areas was to protect
breeding lobster stocks, thereby increasing egg production creating a
spillover effect that would result in more legal-sized adults for
harvest outside the protected area. The fishermen started a tagging
program to track lobster movement.
They also started V-notching some of the female
lobsters: Fishermen used a tool to notch a small V in the tail of
healthy looking females which were carrying eggs, before releasing
them. Since it is illegal to possess V-notched females, fishers would
return trapped ones to the water. It takes at least two years for the
notch to disappear, so females have the opportunity to spawn up to
three more times before being caught in the fishery.
A strong commitment on the part of lobster fishers
is necessary since the V-notching is voluntary. Success demands
involvement of the entire community. It also takes a lot of trust, for
fishers must believe that all involved make similar short term
sacrifices.
A final key component of the community effort was
education.
“Education has to play a major
role,” says George. “You’re not going to
change people overnight. It’s a job to break habits that have
been there for 30, 40, 50 years.”
The fishers involved local schools in entering
data from the lobster tagging studies and developed an education
package on responsible fishing that fit into the social science program.
After four years, the first results started to
emerge. They were remarkable. The closed areas showed substantially
increased egg production and were contributing larger lobsters to the
surrounding areas, providing the spillover effect the fishers were
looking for. The increased catch rate and increased lobster size were
in sharp contrast to adjacent bays which were still showing declines.
Other fishing communities in Newfoundland
couldn’t help but notice these results. They wanted in. There
are currently six more no-take areas in the province and a number of
others are under consideration, all initiated by local communities.
In 1999, the Bonavista Bay communities asked DFO
to consider their closed areas as legislated Marine Protected Areas.
Just a few years earlier, they would have balked at the suggestion that
these productive areas be permanently removed from their fishing
grounds. But the results had spoken for themselves.
“I believe MPA’s are the way
to go,” George says. “People think it is the
management tool that is needed for the survival of the fishery.
At the end of the presentation, George summarized
what he saw as crucial components for a marine protected area to be
successful.
“You have to have the public on your
side, you have to have the stakeholders playing a role,
you’ve got to have [an] education component. People have to
be informed and there has to be funding for enforcement.”
The following day I drove George to Masset for his
next presentation. George was eager to see some of those island deer he
had heard about. The conservationist label was still bothering him.
“It’s all about being
responsible,” he said, as we passed another deer.
“You’ve got to look after the resource.
That‘s all.”
We passed two more deer grazing beside the road.
“I’m told you’ve got
a lot of deer here” he said.
“Tonnes,” I replied.
“Good,” he said.
“Next time I’m out here I’m gonna get me
one of those.”
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The
ABCs of mpas
by Keith Moore
We are surrounded by the ocean. All our lives are
closely knit with the ocean and all of us understand that a healthy
ocean is an integral part of our environment, our communities and our
lives.
It is difficult for us to fully appreciate the
ocean and the great diversity of plants and animals that live within
it. The ocean is something we look at from the surface - and on the
surface it appears the same whether it’s healthy or not. Most
of the life in the sea and the environmental processes which sustain
that life are well hidden from us. The ocean is so vast that it seems
impossible for human activities to alter it and deplete the creatures
that live there. However, people around the world are now realizing
that the ocean is showing the strains of human use and its negative
impacts.
In recent years, marine protected areas have been
established all over the world because they are recognized as vital to
protecting marine biodiversity and addressing the problems in our
oceans. They are a platform from which to begin the long journey to
protecting the health of the ocean and its creatures for the future.
What is a marine protected area?
In the official terminology of the World
Conservation Union (IUCN) a marine protected area is “any
area of intertidal or subtidal terrain together with its overlying
waters and associated fauna, flora and historical and cultural features
which has been reserved by legislation to manage and protect part or
all of the enclosed environment”.
In simple language, this means that a marine
protected area (mpa) is an area with special, or different, status than
areas around it. It means that the types of activities that are
permitted in the water and on the sea bottom are different than the
surrounding area.
There are now over 1300 mpas on every continent.
Each was established for a different reason. They vary greatly in size
and in the types of activities that are allowed within them. In total,
they occupy less than 1% of the world’s ocean.
What is the point of a marine protected
area?
Marine protected areas conserve and protect
species and habitats. They can help restore biological diversity and
productivity. They are used to protect critical or threatened habitats,
like sponge reefs or important areas for seabirds, whales, fish and
shellfish. They provide refuge for fish stocks to rebuild by limiting
fishing in some areas. They are like an insurance policy against the
uncertainties of fisheries science and management. In some countries,
oil exploration or other industrial and commercial developments are
also prohibited within the boundaries of mpas.
How big are they?
Some marine protected areas are very large. The
Great Barrier Reef Marine Park in Australia and the Northwestern
Hawaiian Islands Coral Reef Ecosystem Reserve in Hawaii are both about
340,000 km2 (34 million hectares), almost one-third the land area of
BC! The Macquarrie Island Marine Park, located halfway between
Australia and South America is 162,000 km2.
Most marine protected areas are much smaller. In
BC, there are 124 mpas mostly designated under provincial legislation.
At 2250 km 2 (225,000 ha) they are about 3 times the size of Naikoon
Park (it is 71,000 ha)
Most existing mpas are less than 1 km2 (100
hectares) in size. In New Zealand, the average mpa area is 10.4 km2
(1,040 hectares) with the largest one being 24.1 km2. The proposed
Gwaii Haanas Marine Conservation Area is of moderate size at 3,457.7
km2.
What is allowed in a marine protected
area?
There is no definitive answer to this simple
question. Each mpa has been established for particular reasons and the
uses which are permitted in the area reflect these reasons. Activities
restricted within individual mpas take many different forms and every
place has a different approach.
Some mpas are multiple use areas that are zoned to
allow various uses around central core areas of unique, special and/or
representative habitats. Within the core areas, many or all activities
are restricted. In the Great Barrier Reef mpa, for example, large areas
are zoned with very few restrictions. Fishing and most other activities
are allowed. The large areas surround 26 individual core reserve zones
where all extractive activities are prohibited. These core reserves
account for about 4.6% of the total marine park area. Harmful
activities such as oil exploration, mining, littering, spear fishing
with scuba, and taking of large individuals of some species are
prohibited in all parts of the mpa.
Some mpas are strict reserves where no consumptive
activities are permitted. In New Zealand, for example, marine protected
areas are smaller reserves where all consumptive activities are banned,
including commercial and recreational fishing. In the Channel Islands
National Marine Sanctuary in California, it is proposed that up to 50%
of the 4,294 km2 area be included in reserves where no extractive use
is allowed.
Around the world, mpas involve a balance between
management of human uses and protection of ecological health. Presently
in most countries, recreational and commercial fishing is allowed in
most of the marine protected areas. Larger marine protected areas
include a mix of core areas and multiple use zones.
In BC today, the majority of mpas allow most
activities. Only 5 of the existing 124 mpas are reserves where no
fishing is allowed. All of BC’s mpas are very small and most
are located near West Vancouver and Victoria. In total, they account
for less than 1% of our coastal waters.
In Summary
Marine protected areas are a way to protect the
health of the ocean and the fish, mammals, birds, plants and other life
forms that live there. They are an important part of protecting our
lives, our livelihoods, our cultures and our environment.
Canada has policies to establish marine protected
areas. The “Oceans Strategy” recently announced by
Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO) embraces the creation of Marine
Protected Areas (MPA) using Canada’s Oceans Act. The National
Marine Conservation Areas (NMCA) Act, passed just this year,
facilitates the creation of NMCAs. Here, we will have the opportunity
to consider both kinds of marine protected areas in our waters: a NMCA
surrounding Gwaii Haanas is proposed and the first steps have been
taken to designate the Bowie Seamount a MPA.
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