THE FISHERMAN, SEPTEMBER 25, 1995
THE VOICE OF B.C/S ORGANIZED FISHING INDUSTRY WORKERS
Use Ul aid to re-build
The 1995 salmon fishery is beginning to wind down and the hoped-for fishing opportunities that might have salvaged a season for some haven't materialized. The Fraser River pink run, even if it was better than the 1993 returns, was still far short of the pre-season forecast — and at 25 cents a pound who could take anything home? There was some work for southern cannery workers but for most, it was all too little and too brief.
The stories of hardship are starting to show up: the seine crew members and small boat fishermen who haven't been able to book enough fish even to cover fuel and group, leaving them with, at best, nothing at all, or at worst, boat payments they can't meet and no income to live on.
Among shoreworkers, there are many who have been in the industry a decade and more but have barely had three weeks work all season.
Throughout the industry, few will qualify for unemployment insurance.
As UFAWU officers have been telling government and industry representatives over the past two weeks, there is an immediate, pressing need for emergency assistance through UI and other programs.
What industry workers don't need is the answer they've been getting from some quarters — typified by an editorial in the Vancouver Sun Aug. 14 — that they took the risk by being in the industry in the first place and now they should take the consequences in bad times.
Then there are those who say the country's deficit rales out any assistance programs. Reform Party MPs, particularly, who have been actively soliciting fishermen's support, turn around and tell them they don't deserve government support at the time they need it most.
Yes, there is industry re-structuring in the works. But just to cut people loose and let the foreclosures fall where they may, as the Sun suggested, would simply leave behind a number of well-off vessel owners and licence holders. That won't re-design a fishery for sustainability or provide answers for coastal communities striving to maintain an economic base.
And yes, there's a desperate need for more full-time jobs in the processing sector — and no one has been pressing for that harder than UFAWU members who have jointly established industry committees to find ways of bringing more work into existing plants. But as the Task Force on Seasonal Workers found earlier this year, seasonal work is a vital part of this country's economy and it's not going to be eliminated by taking hard-up workers off UI and dumping them on to social services. That's a recipe for a depressed country as well as a depressed industry.
Finally, as the report of Fraser sockeye on the front page of this issue notes, there is a future in this industry and a solid hope for salmon runs at historic levels. Governments and industry need to invest some money now, put people to work reclaiming marshes and rehabilitating streams— and doing all the other work that goes into rebuilding a resource. That's the kind of emergency employment project that bring some bring some benefits to industry workers now — and build something for the future.'**
The Tiiherman
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BOSTON-BOUND: Fraser River gillnetter Edgar Birch will be keeping his net on the drum when others go fall fishing this year and heading off instead to the Boston Marriott Copley Place hotel in Boston, Mass. Oct. 11-14 to be part of the festivities marking the joint 50th anniversary convention of the Fisheries Council of Canada and the National Fisheries Institute in the U.S. Edgar was chosen as "Person of the Year" to represent B.C. fishermen at the event after his name had been submitted to the Fisheries Council by UFAWU first vice-president
Dennis Brown. He'll be joined by representatives from five fisheries regions in the U.S. as well as Atlantic Canada.
According to the FCC's letter to Birch, a number of fishermen are to be honoured this
Edgar Birch ... aboard gillnetter Bev-Mark.
year because "FCC and NFI want to recognize the role and contribution of the people who harvest the fisheries resource. They are the backbone of the industry...."
Edgar admits to be a little dubious about some of the company he'll be keeping — apparently Richard Nixon has also been a recipient of the Fisheries Institute's Person of the Year award, along with Senator Warren Magnuson and cooking author Julia Child — but he says he's happy to take his place at the podium when the time comes. Maybe he'll get a chance to tell them a thing or two about Fraser River salmon.
SALVATION:
Feel overwhelmed by run failure, dwindling stocks, reallocation? Fish farming could be your salvation. At least that's what Ted Needham, head of aquacul-ture operations for B.C. Packers, is claiming in the July edition of Northern Aquaculture. "We are a lot like dairy farmers," he told a forum on aquaculture and the environment at the 12th annual Aquaculture Association of Canada meeting in June. "Just as cattle farming saved the few remaining bison (from complete extinction) so aquaculture will be seen in the future as having saved the wild salmon."
Considering everything that's happened this season, we're awfully relieved to hear that. But there is one nagging question, Ted: why are there no wild salmon left in Norway?
NORTHWEST PASSAGE:
When it comes to what we know about the Northwest Passage, the exploration carried by
Croation vessels probably wouldn't be the first thing to come to mind for most people. We'd more likely recall the RCMP vessel, the St. Roch, or the ill-fated Franklin Expedition from a century earlier, immortalized in Stan Rogers' song. But seiner Tony Matalija tells us that Croation vessels have explored the passage in the past and the latest of those, the Hvratska Cigra (Arctic Tern) is currently in Alaskan waters, following a route taken by an earlier Croation crew. The 50-tonne, 2 3-metre ship, which is on an Arctic-Antarctic expedition, passed through Lancaster Sound in July, en route from Melville Bay, Greenland.
Tony says the Hvratska Cigra is expected to be in Vancouver at the end of September and fishermen are invited down to see the ship and meet skipper Mladen Sutej and his crew. The Croation community is also planning a banquet to celebrate the expedition. Although details on when and where the vessel will dock when in Vancouver weren't available at Fisherman press time, Tony may have more information by the time this paper comes out. You can call him at 931-8182.
ONCE ONLY: UFAWU Pension Plan administrator Sandra Gertsch tell us that shoreworkers and tendermen will now be getting a statement only once a year, instead of a twice annual statement.
The new statement will go out in March or April of the year and will list members' pension contributions and earnings. Previously, two statements went out, once in March and one in November.
But if members need an additional statement at any other time, Sandra says, "they can call us at the pension office and we'll send one out."**
