DFO Achievements Since April 1, 2009

September 15, 2009

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Canada’s Economic Action Plan at Work

• Progress is well under way and moving quickly on the repair and maintenance of core commercial fishing harbours across Canada with 217 projects in the engineering phase, tendering process, under way or complete.  This represents over 80% of the $200 million investment in small craft harbours announced as part of Canada’s Economic Action Plan earlier this year.
  
  
• This funding is also supporting construction of a new small craft harbour in Pangnirtung, Nunavut, which was announced on August 20 by Prime Minister Stephen Harper. Harbour improvements will support commercial fishing for years to come. On site work on this project is expected to begin later this month.
  
  
• Through the Economic Action Plan (EAP), the Canadian Coast Guard (CCG) has signed new contracts for: five new motor lifeboats, 25 new rigid-hull inflatable boats, design of three new inshore fisheries science vessels, and 30 new environmental barges. These investments were made possible through the $175 million in EAP funding announced earlier this year for major repair and fleet life extension projects.
  
  
• EAP resources will deliver $28.2 million to modernize DFO’s laboratories and science facilities in British Columbia, Manitoba, Quebec, New Brunswick, and Newfoundland and Labrador as part of the $250 million EAP investment in federal laboratory improvements. This includes $8 million invested in DFO’s Salmonid Enhancement Program facilities and hatcheries throughout British Columbia.
  
  
• The lobster industry in Atlantic Canada has been provided access to $10 million in development funding as part of the two-year, $1-billion Community Adjustment Fund to support coastal communities affected by the declining global demand for seafood. The funding was provided by the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency (ACOA) and Canada Economic Development for Quebec Regions (CED-Q).

Sustainable fisheries

The Government of Canada has:

• invested $1.4 million to date—of a $4.7 million commitment—for aquaculture innovation projects in British Columbia, Quebec and Newfoundland and Labrador through the Aquaculture Innovation and Market Access Program.
  
  
• committed $65 million to help fishers in the Atlantic lobster industry adapt to the market conditions created by the global recession. This investment includes:
  
  
  • Up to $35 million over five years for measures to help the industry improve its sustainability by enhancing conservation to meet eco-certification requirements
  • Up to $15 million over five years for lobster-dependent fishers and their associations who have experienced low landings and a corresponding drop in income from lobster
  • Up to $15 million this year in Short-Term Transitional Contributions for Lobster-Harvesters who have experienced a significant drop in income from lobster harvesting in 2009.

Advancing science

• Canada joined Spain, the United Kingdom, the United States of America and Russia in a groundbreaking international survey of vulnerable marine ecosystems in the largely unknown deep water terrain and ecosystem of the Continental Shelf off Canada’s East Coast. Working collaboratively with international partners, DFO will use the new information collected to better identify and protect sensitive areas, while allowing responsible fisheries to continue.
  
  
• The Canadian Coast Guard partnered with the United States Coast Guard for a second time to conduct a joint survey of the extended continental shelf in the western Arctic Ocean. The 40-day survey will continue the data-collection collaboration that began during last summer’s joint mission and will focus on the region north of Alaska onto Alpha-Mendeleev Ridge and eastward toward the Canadian Arctic Archipelago.

Asserting Canada’s coastal presence

• The Canadian Coast Guard participated in Operation Nanook, Canada’s most ambitious sovereignty exercise to date. Over 700 participants cooperated in sovereignty patrolling, a military exercise and an integrated whole-of-government exercise to enable federal and territorial partners to exercise the knowledge and skills necessary to practice inter-departmental coordination.
  
  
• DFO has invested $75 million to provide aerial surveillance of Canada’s inland coastal and offshore waters. The program provides the capability to monitor domestic and foreign vessel activities and detect potential violations and provides information on pollution surveillance, environmental monitoring and marine security to a number of other federal departments and agencies.

Protecting Species at Risk

• Working together with the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), DFO developed a recovery strategy for the North Atlantic Right Whale. The strategy includes a number of ship-collision, gear-entanglement, research, communications, whale-watching, and regulatory and enforcement recommendations.
  
  
• DFO expects to soon finalize recovery strategies for the Lake chubsucker and the Atlantic population of Blue Whales.
  
  
• Fisheries and Oceans Canada finalized a management plan for the Olympia oyster, found off Canada’s Pacific coast. It is illegal to commercially harvest Olympia oysters from the wild, although they can be harvested from regulated aquaculture farms.
  
  
• DFO expects to soon finalize a management plan for the Pacific population of Harbour porpoise, as well as a multi-species management plans for the blackstripe topminnow, Pugnose minnow, Spotted sucker and Warmouth. 

Renewing the CanadianCoast Guard Fleet

• Canadian Coast Guard awarded a $194 million contract for nine new mid-shore patrol vessels, which will be used to support fisheries enforcement and enhance the security of coasts and waterways.
  
  
• The Canadian Coast Guard updated its long-term Fleet Renewal Plan to guide the acquisition of new vessels, including Canada’s new polar icebreaker – the CCGS John G. Diefenbaker – which will be delivered in 2017.
  
  
• DFO and the Canadian Coast Guard are participating in the Government of Canada’s consultations with the shipbuilding industry on the development of a long-term, sustainable shipbuilding strategy to renew the federal fleet.