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| Dr. Jeffrey Hutchings is the Canada Research Chair in Marine Conservation and Biodiversity at AV俱乐部.(Danny Abriel photo) |
Since the federal Species at Risk Act was passed in 2002, not a single marine fish has been added to the legal list of species at risk.
The northern Atlantic cod, for example, was assessed by the Committee of the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada (COSEWIC) as endangered off Newfoundland and Labrador in 2003. But, despite a decline estimated at 99 per cent, Atlantic cod hasn鈥檛 been added to the list.
COSEWIC makes recommendations, but final decisions rest ultimately with the Minister of the Environment, who consults with the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans on aquatic species.
鈥淔rom COSEWIC鈥檚 perspective, it鈥檚 not as though we can be frustrated by such decisions,鈥� says Dr. Jeffrey Hutchings, the chair of COSEWIC. 鈥淲e provide scientific advice and it鈥檚 not our place to criticize if that advice is not heeded.鈥�
But as a scientist and Canada Research Chair in Marine Conservation and Biodiversity at AV俱乐部, Dr. Hutchings finds such decisions problematic. Marine fishes are not being added, he believes, primarily because of the perceived economic consequences of doing so.
鈥淚f we continue to not add marine fish to the legal list, I don鈥檛 think we鈥檙e sending the right signal to the international community about Canada鈥檚 commitment to conservation and the protection of marine biodiversity,鈥� he says.
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| The numbers of the porbeagle shark have been depleted by 90 per cent since the 1960s. |
The case of the porbeagle, the only shark for which there is a directed harvest in Canada, is particularly troubling, since its numbers are so low (depleted by 90 per cent since the 1960s) and it takes so long to rebound.
鈥淏y the government鈥檚 own reckoning, only one or two fishers are economically dependent on porbeagle. Under a worst-case scenario, listing might have led to a loss of eight jobs and an economic reduction of two per cent to a single community,鈥� according to a paper, Biases in Legal Listing under Canadian Endangered Species Legislation. The paper, published in Conservation Biology earlier this year, was co-written by Dr. Hutchings and scientists at Simon Fraser University, University of British Columbia, and Universit茅 de Sherbrooke.
The paper concludes: 鈥淲e document here a pattern consistent with bias against marine and northern species in legal listing.鈥�