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The federal government has recently made changes that will have significant impacts to protection of fish habitat. They have done this by narrowing the authority of the Fisheries Act for habitat protection so that far fewer works and undertakings fall under its jurisdiction, and by substantially reducing staff and resources dedicated to fish habitat management and protection.
Changes to the Fisheries Act
The previous Fisheries Act prohibited the “harmful alteration, disruption or destruction of fish habitat”. The new Fisheries Act prohibits “serious harm” which is “the killing of fish, or the permanent alteration or destruction of fish habitat”. The effect of this change is that works that are not permanent but can cause significant negative effects to fish habitat may not be prohibited under the new Fisheries Act. This has very serious implications for fish such as Pacific salmon which can be highly impacted by activities that are “temporary”. For example, it has been well documented in scientific literature that streamside vegetation is very important for salmon, and salmon densities have been shown to be significantly reduced where streamside vegetation has been removed. The removal of streamside vegetation has been proven in court to constitute the harmful alteration, disruption or destruction of fish habitat, and was prohibited under the old Fisheries Act. Based on the definition of “serious harm” under the new Fisheries Act, riparian vegetation removal will likely not be prohibited as long as the trees eventually grow back, even if it takes decades. This impact that has been prohibited since the early 1980’s has now been made legal by the federal government. There are other works that can cause significant but temporary impacts such as depositing sediment in spawning gravels, reducing instream flows, and dredging streambeds that have all been prohibited in the past which will likely no longer be prohibited under the new Fisheries Act.
Changes to Habitat Program delivery
On October 24, DFO announced very significant changes to Habitat Program delivery. There were 4 major changes:
1. The numbers of staff will be reduced by about 30%. This will obviously reduce the amount of fish habitat related work DFO is able to do. This means fewer development projects will receive a review by DFO, DFO will have less influence to ensure that projects avoid impacts to fish habitat, there will be less monitoring, less enforcement, and less effort on stewardship, outreach and education.
2. The remaining staff are being largely centralized to Vancouver and Nanaimo. This will mean that there will be very few habitat staff located in some of B.C.’s most important salmon waters (Fraser River, Skeena, etc), and none for other major watersheds such as the Peace and Columbia. This will contribute to a loss of first-hand knowledge about the condition of fish habitat in many important waters, a loss of the ability to provide local service in communities, and all management and priority setting being undertaken from locations far away from where much of the important fish habitat is located.
3. The remaining positions are being re-classified and a majority are being downgraded from current levels. The majority of habitat positions will now be what is currently an entry level position which is typically associated with lower levels of experience (<5 years), and are assigned the more routine and less complex projects to review. DFO has been experiencing significant backlogs for project reviews and a significant number of these are very complex projects requiring skilled assessment and problem solving from experienced staff. The removal of a majority of experienced staff from the program will leave DFO with significantly less experience and capacity to review complex and challenging files.
4. The remaining staff are being organized to focus on major development sectors (forestry, oil & gas, mining, etc.). This shift focuses more DFO attention to development interests than it does on managing and protecting habitat that is important for fish.
The combined effect of the changes described above are going to significantly reduce DFO’s capacity to manage and protect fish habitat. The federal government has stated that these changes will not reduce DFO’s ability to manage and protect habitat but this is not supported by the effects of these decisions. The federal government is now saying that fish habitat will be adequately protected by re-focussing the Fisheries Act and the Habitat Program to large development projects, and not getting involved in “smaller projects”. Many salmon fisheries in B.C. have been experiencing significant and ongoing declines. There are multiple factors contributing to this problem, but one of the significant factors that is within our control is the effect of human activity on fish habitat. There have been numerous reports and studies that have identified that habitat for salmon in B.C. is being impacted on an ongoing basis, and that for the most part, these problems are the result of the cumulative impacts from human activities. There have been several reports from the Auditor General that have identified this problem, and it has not been addressed thus far. Managing the big stuff and ignoring the little stuff = acceptance of cumulative effects. Even with a serious investment in management and protection salmon are at high risk of serious decline where they exist with large human populations. This effect is likely to be even more pronounced with reduced regulatory oversight, and reduced laws protecting habitat. The recent changes to the Fisheries Act and the Habitat Program take DFO further away from being able to manage and address the key issues for salmon habitat.
DFO has suggested that the gap created by these changes will be taken up by industry who will be able to manage their effects on fish habitat on their own. The reality is that industry can do this now if they choose to, and the record will show that very, very few have been able to adequately self manage to a standard that will provide for limited impacts to fish habitat to provide for ongoing sustainability.
Additionally, DFO currently has a Wild Salmon Policy for Pacific Salmon. A key element of this Policy is to understand the current state of salmon habitat, to manage habitat to minimize impacts, and to restore and enhance habitat to improve situations where problems are detected. These recent changes take DFO in the opposite direction from the guidance in the Wild Salmon Policy and ignore DFO’s own well founded advice and guidance for managing salmon habitat.
There has been messaging from the federal government that these changes to the Fisheries Act and Habitat program are necessary to improve the economy. This overlooks the very serious consequences and cost from allowing impacts to fish habitat to occur, and then trying to save fish populations and restore habitat after major problems emerge. In the US, $750M to $1B are spent annually (!) on fish and wildlife monitoring, enhancement and restoration due largely to effects from development in that watershed. The costs to society are much greater when we try to fix these problems after they occur as compared to managing effectively to try to prevent the problems from occurring. Arguments that reduced habitat protection is necessary to support a healthy economy ignore these kinds of examples that are directly comparable to our situation, and it is often taxpayers who foot the bill for restoration and recovery when a species or stock becomes imperilled.
B.C. has a landscape and fisheries that are highly valued ecologically, economically and socially, and are very sensitive to habitat impacts. Despite these special values, the federal government has insisted on a National model being applied to fish habitat management in B.C. that does not provide for appropriate resources to manage the habitat for the salmon and other fish that are so special to B.C. and to Canada.
The DFO Habitat Program has provided an oversight function akin to a referee in a hockey game – everyone knows the rules, but there is incentive to push the rules to their limits to gain an advantage. The referee in a hockey game interprets what is acceptable and what isn’t, and has authority to intervene when it is determined that the rules are being broken. This is analogous to the function that the DFO Habitat Program provides, and the rules have been changed, there are fewer referees, and they will be less experienced. With fewer and less experienced staff located far away from many of our most important salmon habitats, how will anyone know if we are getting good results? More than likely, we will have no idea until some kind of crisis emerges, and everyone will wonder why government had no idea the problem was developing.
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Topic: Your Fish, Your Habitat (Read 2535 times)