Tag Archives: 200-mile economic zone in 1977
Opinion: A lesson unlearned in fisheries
Canadian Fisheries Minister Dominic LeBlanc
has followed his father’s example by allowing inshore fishermen to continue catching northern shrimp off Newfoundland and Labrador. Under pressure to ban the inshore fleet to protect dwindling stocks, the minister decided instead to trim quotas for all harvesting sectors in the shrimp fishery. Dominic’s father, the late Romeo LeBlanc, served as Canada’s minister of fisheries when Canada proclaimed the 200-mile economic zone in 1977. The elder LeBlanc was determined to manage the industry on behalf of inshore fishermen and small coastal communities adjacent to the resource. To that end, he required fishermen to operate their own vessels, forbade processors from owning vessels and fought the introduction of factory freezer trawlers. In short, father Romeo battled the “corporatization” of the fishery. Son Dominic won’t re-introduce those measures, but his decision on northern shrimp does seem Romeo-esque. On Thursday, he announced the Department of Fisheries and Oceans is abolishing the “last-in, first-out” (LIFO) policy in the northern shrimp fishery. Read the rest here 19:44
