Oceana Canada says shutting down the capelin fishery is the right thing to do, but the Association of Seafood Producers calls suggestions that the fishery be closed “misguided.”
The Director of Science with Oceana Canada, Dr. Robert Rangely, says the capelin stock, on which other fish and marine animals prey, is well in the critical zone and a temporary closure, while painful, will help the stock rebuild thus ensuring a successful and sustainable fishery for years to come.
He says the nature of the fish and their life cycle is such that the stock can rebuild in just five to ten years. Rangely says Norway and Iceland closed their capelin fisheries for a few years and benefitted from a subsequent boom.
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Meanwhile, ASP Executive Director Derek Butler says they appreciate the vital role of capelin in the ecosystem and the economy. He says science shows favourable environmental conditions including earlier beach spawning.
He argues that with the proportion of the catch that would die naturally in the spawning process, the percentage of females in the catch, and the number of females that would make it back into the population, the point does not hold. He says a few thousand tonnes of capelin, perhaps as low as 2,000 or 3,000 metric tonnes, does not drive the stock dynamic.
