DFO poised to shake up fishery for tiny eels in 'devastating' blow to licence holders

The federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans is poised to impose a major shakeup on the lucrative but problem-plagued Maritime fishery for juvenile eels, stripping most commercial operations of nearly all their quota and handing it to individual fishermen and First Nations.

In a letter Thursday, the department proposes that six licence holders, many of which pioneered the industry and slogged through years of low prices before the recent boom, will lose 80 to 90 per cent of the quota they fished before 2022. The remaining three will see cuts of about 60 per cent.

"The minister and DFO has taken this fishery, which has provided great-paying jobs and community support for decades, and they've basically destroyed it," said Stanley King, whose company Atlantic Elver Fishery Ltd. will lose 81 per cent of its quota.

The tiny eels, known as elvers, are fished during the spring along Nova Scotia and New Brunswick rivers and then shipped to Asia to be raised to adulthood for food. As demand rose and prices soared, the fishery has descended into lawlessness, with poaching, threats and violence.

Some Mi'kmaq and Wolastoqiyik have claimed a treaty right to fish for elvers. A number of licence holders have said they would volunteer to give up quota to allow more First Nations to fish, but only if the federal government is willing to compensate them, something DFO has balked at.

Officials have indicated in recent months they were examining giving half of the overall total allowable catch of 9,960 kilograms to First Nations and another slice to 150 fishermen, but Thursday's letter outlines for the first time the full implications for both harvesters and commercial outfits.

In addition to the large chunk of the elver fishery that will head to First Nations, the proposal would also transfer nearly 30 per cent of the total allowable catch to individual fishermen, many of whom have worked for elver fishing companies but will now be given their own small commercial licences.

Most will be allowed to catch 22 kilograms apiece, although a number who will transition from fishing for full-grown eels will only be allocated five kilograms.

The department has said the aim is to "broaden the distribution of the prosperity" of the fishery, and Fisheries Minister Diane Lebouthillier has cited elver prices as high as $5,000 a kilogram to illustrate the money that can be made.

CBC has sought an interview with DFO on the proposed changes.

Robert Selig, who fishes for elvers in Nova Scotia's Shelburne County, said he's beginning to crunch the numbers. However, he said, many fishermen were already satisfied working for a commercial licence holder, making good money but not being burdened by the business side of the fishery.

He noted individual fishermen don't have holding tanks to keep elvers alive. He said the price cited by the minister reflected an unusually good year, and he worries what will happen to his livelihood if the value of elvers tanks.

Most fishermen, Selig said, are more interested in DFO cracking down on the violence and chaos that has come to plague riversides during the spring season.

"It's nice to actually have some numbers, but we have a long way to go, a long way to go to get this back under control to the point where people are not living in fear," he said.

"In the last few years doing this, that is what it has been, living in fear. Am I being followed home? Is somebody going to be coming to my house when I'm sleeping at night to try to steal my gear?"

Michel Samson, a lawyer who represents Guysborough County licence holder Wine Harbour Fisheries Ltd., said DFO's refusal to compensate commercial elver groups will simply undermine Indigenous reconciliation efforts by creating anger and more chaos.

Wine Harbour faces an 89 per cent quota cut, which Samson said is an "absolutely devastating" blow to the family-owned business that's poured money into the industry. He said the company has $2 million worth of elver holding facilities, boats, trucks and oxygen tanks.

"DFO has somehow forgotten the infrastructure required to handle these very delicate elvers and to make sure that they're kept live, they're caught sustainably, and that they can be shipped out as a live product," Samson said.