Tag Archives: Northern Cod Moratorium

Speakers list released for today’s event to mark 30th anniversary of northern cod moratorium

The speakers list for the event scheduled for this afternoon to mark the 30th anniversary of the announced shutdown of Newfoundland and Labrador’s most iconic fishery has been finalized. Moratorium Story, 30 Years On will include speakers Ches Crosbie, Toni Kearney, Merv Wiseman, Kimberly OrrenGus Etchegary, the Honourable Clyde Wells, Wilfred Bartlett, Amy House/Bernie Stapleton, and Mike Hearn. Biographies are included at the end of this release. Ryan Cleary will also speak and host the event, with music provided by Newfoundland folk singer Jim Payne. >click to read< 10:31

An open invitation to the public – Event to mark the 30th anniversary of northern cod moratorium

An event to mark the 30th anniversary of the announced shutdown of Newfoundland and Labrador’s most iconic fishery is scheduled for next week, with an open invitation to the public to support and share in the historic milestone. “The impact of the moratorium has had a deep and profound impact on the province’s psyche, culture, and economy,” says Ryan Cleary, one of the organizers of the non-partisan event — Moratorium Story, Northern Cod 30 Years On. “It must be recognized for the good of past and future generations.” The event is scheduled for Thursday, June 30th, 1:30 p.m.-3:30 p.m., in Salon B at the Delta Hotel in downtown St. John’s, the same room where the late John Crosbie, then-federal minister of Fisheries and Oceans, made the announcement on July 2, 1992. >Details, click to read< 14:14

29 years of northern cod moratorium have cost NL at least $26 billion

In his 1992 book, No Fish and Our Lives, Some Survival Notes for Newfoundland, Cabot Martin wrote that a rebuilt northern cod stock could support annual harvesters of 400,000 tonnes (881 million/lbs).The moratorium remains the biggest layoff in Canadian history, and while there’s a small-scale inshore stewardship fishery, Fisheries and Oceans does not set a total-allowable catch (TAC), and it’s not considered a full-fledged commercial fishery. Where are we today? All three commercial cod stocks adjacent to Newfoundland and Labrador are categorized by DFO scientists as in the critical zone, meaning removals are to be kept to a minimum. >click to read< 25 Years ago Today – The Northern Cod Moratorium – Sunday, July 2,   marks a quarter of a century since then federal fisheries minster John Crosbie announced what was planned to be a two-year moratorium on the northern cod fishery. It continues on today, though it has often seemed lost in the wake of a lucrative crab and shrimp fishery that remarkably saved the industry and many communities. But back in 1992, a province settled and built on the back of the mighty cod fishery, >click to read< 11:20

‘This place was cod’

If you took a drive through Port Union in the 1980s, you would have had to slow down driving past the fish plant.  In those days, over 1000 people worked at the plant — then owned by Fishery Products International (FPI) — and vehicles filled the plant parking lot and lined both sides of the road. With three shifts, working day and night, the plant was operating 24 hours a day, seven days a week, processing cod fish landed by the FPI offshore trawlers. Back then the plant was operating almost 52 weeks of the year, with a 10-day shutdown during Christmas when the trawlers came in for the holidays. An estimated 1,400 workers in that area alone were directly affected by the closure of the cod fishery in 1992. Darryl Johnson was one of them. click here to read the story 12:03

25 Years ago Today – The Northern Cod Moratorium

Sunday, July 2, marks a quarter of a century since then federal fisheries minster John Crosbie announced what was planned to be a two-year moratorium on the northern cod fishery. It continues on today, though it has often seemed lost in the wake of a lucrative crab and shrimp fishery that remarkably saved the industry and many communities. But back in 1992, a province settled and built on the back of the mighty cod fishery — a renewable resource if properly taken care of — was knocked off course with the swipe of a pen. Some fishermen tried to knock down the doors to the hotel conference room in St. John’s where the announcement was made that July 2, 1992. Other fishermen who were forced to lay down their cod traps and nets, wanted to burn their boats. About 40,000 people were put out of work in Newfoundland and Labrador and the other Atlantic provinces combined. click here to read the story 09:10