Sports fishery is poorly controlled and monitored

Re: New halibut allocation will devastate coastal life, Feb. 24

Lanny Sawchuk’s article concerning the new halibut allocation states that, “conservation of the stock is not the issue here ...”

As one of the commissioners on the International Pacific Halibut Commission ( IPHC), to which Mr. Sawchuk refers, I can say that exceeding the catch limit is exactly what comes to mind when I think of the recreational fishery in B. C.

In five of the last six years the sports fishery has over- fished halibut in B. C. waters to the tune of a million pounds.

This undermines conservation and responsible management, particularly given that halibut stocks are in a period of low abundance.

The sports fishery is poorly controlled and monitored. Overfishing in this sector has not been their fault but rather the DFO’S ( Department of Fisheries and Oceans), which has failed to keep them to their allocation.

Now the minister has seen fit to give them more allocation, 25 per cent more than previous.

Compare this to the commercial halibut fishery in B. C., where every fish is observed coming aboard, either by observer or visual imagery ( cameras). Every species caught is weighed to the exact pound and recorded dockside by government validators.

In commercial logbooks, piece counts of each species are provided to DFO validators, to compare with the visual imagery taken off hard drives from the computers that every commercial boat must have.

If allocation is taken from a sector of the fishery that is 100 per cent monitored and given to a sector that is unmonitored and has overfished in recent history, that becomes a conservation concern for the IPHC.

It is incumbent on the minister to direct his department to initiate monitoring and reporting requirements on the recreational fishery. Not to do so would be a move away from responsible fisheries management. GARY ROBINSON Vancouver