Allocation Policy Roadblock

Copied below is a Table from the North Coast Update to August 24th. It shows the sockeye catch and Allocation split between gear types for Areas 3,4,5. In the Integrated Fisheries Management Plan (IFMP) the formal Allocation split of sockeye is 75% gillnet to 25% seine.

We have approached DFO with this inquiry in the past but have received no replies worthy of mentioning but this Allocation split seems to be the crux of the issue over selective fishing. How is it that the Department can talk about selective fishing to the public or the Marine Stewardship Council when there is a formal agreement in place that guarantees 75% of the Skeena sockeye available to non-selective gillnetters?

Fisheries types call the Allocation process the 'third rail' of fishery topics....touch it and you die type stuff. But, this situation is really at the heart of the matter. We will not see any forward progress on selective fishing, as promised by DFO to the MSC, until this small but overwhelmingly important Allocation agreement is changed. And until DFO does formally change this split, anything they say about selective fishing will be pure rhetoric...

DFO: When will you come clean and change this policy??

Allocation for Areas 3,4,5:

                           Gill Net             Seine        Totals

Area 3                   70,148               61,428       131,576

Area 4&5             250,055              65,186        315,241

Skeena Inland      33,230              14,450        47,680

Totals                  353,433            141,064        494,497

Gear Allocation      71%                 29%

Overage/underage -17,440 17,440