By Andrew de Souza

Future of fishing industry an uncertainty

Apr 30, 2011 | 7:37 AM

The future of freshwater and commercial fishing in the province remains uncertain for many in the industry.

The Saskatchewan Co-Operative Fisheries held their annual general meeting in Prince Albert, and many members expressed their dismay at the hurdles the industry is facing.

The main issue is the province’s move to opt out of the federal government’s Freshwater Fish Marketing Corporation, which has the monopoly in the industry, coupled with the provincial government’s unwillingness to invest in the industry.

Opting out of the monopoly means fishers and producers can market their products to whomever and wherever they want –but the problem is the industry lacks the infrastructure to process, market and ship the products.

As a solution, members in the industry have formed a limited partnership to create a plant in Prince Albert, but for the past few years funding and investors have been difficult to find and the province has repeatedly said it would not provide funding.

Raiders AGM

Raiders impact on Prince Albert local economy continues to go up: AGM report

10h ago

Court proceedings

'The impact of this trauma will echo for generations': court case surrounding La Ronge woman's death reaches conclusion

Dec 11, 2024

Going Global

P.A.'s Zablocki named to Team Canada for U18 Women's World Championships

Dec 11, 2024

“The government just shut the door on us,” said Brian MacDonald, president of the cooperative. “They said ‘we’ll opt out of the monopoly but we won’t help you at all to set up and get yourselves going.’”

Currently the opt out date is in April 2012, so the industry is hoping to have a solution well in place by then. Otherwise, that could mean a lot product could get wasted for lack of a buyer.

That’s not the only problem the fishers of Northern Saskatchewan are facing. Tourism has been increasing for many years. While they bring in tourism dollars, they remove a lot of fish and that means lower catch quotas for the commercial sector.

MacDonald said those factors, plus pollution means the future is incredibly uncertain.

“It’s very shaky right now,” he said “We’re very unclear as to what, in five years, we’re going to be.”

“A lot of lakes have been taken over by users and they’re slowly picking at us until we’re just a handful and we don’t mean nothing anymore and we’re no longer an industry.”

adesouza@panow.com