Challenges and Opportunities with Commercial Fisheries in Eastern Canada

The profile of commercial fisheries in Eastern Canada has changed substantially over the past 25 years from a fishery dominated by groundfish (primarily cod) to a fishery dominated by crustaceans (primarily snow crab, lobster and shrimp). The simultaneous collapse of almost all cod stocks in the early 1990s and their lack of recovery is primarily responsible for this change. Much research in the 1990s has focused on trying to sort out the relative importance of environmental change (widespread cooling in the NW Atlantic) and fishing in explaining the collapse. The Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) has been trying for a decade to develop precautionary approach frameworks to manage fisheries in a sustainable way. I will review these advances toward sustainability.  I will finally compare the relative success that DFO has had in managing fish and invertebrate stocks, including a comparison of the implementation of the Precautionary approach in both species groups.