Inuit walk out of DFO meeting on landlocked cod

Three out of five people who turned up to what was billed as a public consultation on the future of Nunavut’s landlocked cod walked out after just a few minutes.

The three, all Inuit, appeared to be frustrated that there was no interpreter, no apparent agenda, and an official from the federal department of fisheries and oceans who did not bother to welcome them.

Rather, the official, who is the DFO’s fishery manager from Winnipeg, kept his back turned to the audience as he spoke.

“It wasn’t much of a consultation,” said Peter Keenainak from Qikiqtaaluk Corporation, who also sits on the Baffin Fisheries Coalition and was one of the three who chose not to stay.

The Government of Nunavut had sent two staff members to the meeting who remained after the three others left.

“We want an open and transparent process,” the GN’s fisheries manager Wayne Lynch said at the meeting.

“If we’re confused, what about the local people?” Lynch said to Sam Stephenson, who was sent up from Winnipeg by the DFO to coordinate the community consultation.

According to a DFO consultation workshop booklet, public consultation is used to consider whether to add the cod to the list of species at risk.

Had Inuit fully participated at the consultation in Iqaluit, the DFO might have learned that Inuit consider these giant cod too large and bad-tasting to waste much time or energy catching.

So the cod probably aren’t much at risk.

But the GN took this consultation seriously, because it wants to make sure that both science and traditional knowledge is taken into consideration. That’s because there’s a lot at stake.

A new federal law can put prohibitions in place that make it an offence “to kill, harm, harass, capture or take an individual” of any species listed at risk of extinction.

The Species at Risk Act, which came into force in 2003, requires the assessing and listing of wildlife and ensures species that are listed as threatened or endangered are protected through harvesting bans and/or mandatory recovery or action plans.

The feeble public consultation in Iqaluit doesn’t bode well for similar consultations that may be held the next time a species is added to the risk list.

SARA already lists 233 species that receive protection under the law, but the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada, the group that assesses and decides how healthy species are, wants to add Nunavut’s Atlantic cod stock to SARA’s list because it says research shows the species’ survival is “of special concern.”

The cod, measuring up to four and half feet long and weighing in at more than 70 pounds, are unique to Nunavut, and have only been found in a handful of lakes along Frobisher Bay and the Cumberland Sound. The landlocked cod ended up in these lakes at the end of the last ice age, 5,000 to 8,000 years ago.

If these cod are added to SARA’s list of species at risk, a management plan will be designed to protect the stock.

The GN is worried about the impact of adding the cod to the list and declaring them “of special concern.” As northern waters warm, Atlantic cod could be found, not just in those lakes, but also in the seas, and if they’re subject to protection, this could prevent any local cod fishery from developing.

There’s always the chance, said Lynch, that if Nunavut’s Atlantic cod are on the “of special concern” list, the DFO may say later “look that’s the way it is: we have no say in it.”

The GN is also concerned how any catch of Atlantic cod could be regulated through a management plan — since fish catches usually aren’t counted by individual fish landed but by weight.

Stephenson said he had heard the lake cod were being caught near Panniqtuuq for use as bait.

He also criticized media attention devoted to the existence of these unusual cod — although the presence of huge cod in Ogac Lake near Iqaluit and in a few other lakes is common knowledge to Inuit, who haven’t overfished them yet.

“People look at these photos and they want to get a piece of it,” Stephenson said.

Similar public consultations were planned in Panniqtuuq and Qikiqtarjuaq.

The DFO plans to ask COSEWIC to be more specific about whether its “of special concern” status would apply only to the lake-bound Atlantic cod before proceeding with its decision to add Nunavut’s Atlantic cod on the Species at Risk list.

Anyone with something to say about the cod can send comments to fwisar@dfo-mpo.gc.ca before Nov. 15.