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September 22nd, 2009 – Halifax, Nova Scotia
by Edward Stern
As the Canadian Maritimes continued to bask in gorgeous early autumn weather on Tuesday, the crew of Ocean Watch prepared for a Wednesday departure bound some 360-nautical miles to their next port of call in Boston, Massachusetts. The ETA for Boston is sometime Friday.
For the previous leg from Newfoundland, a very able seaman and a fisheries expert from the Marine Institute in St. John’s joined the Ocean Watch team, and today Ed Stern takes command of the crew log with a report on the state of the fishing industry on and around the Grand Banks.
Born in St. Louis, Missouri, Edward Stern found his way to the sea at an early age. He began sailing in Downeast Maine at age 10, and has since grown to work p rofessionally as a sailor, boatbuilder, marine surveyor, biological technician, marine systems technician, NOAA fishery management specialist and commercial fisherman in both Alaska and Newfoundland. Edward holds a diploma in Marine Systems, a BA in Human Ecology, and a MMS in Fisheries Resource Management. He lives in St. John’s, Newfoundland with his wife Valerie and stepson Ryan. You can contact Edward in Newfoundland at ed.stern (at) mi.mun.ca or stern.ed (at) gmail.com.
With no further adieu, here’s his report, entitled, “The Headstones of Industry.”
When asked, “Why did you go to Newfoundland?” I have a standard reply: “to study the cod fishery. It’s the front-page case study of a failed fishery in any fishery management textbook.”
I came to eastern Canada directly from commercial fishing in Southeast Alaska, which is a remarkable place full of unique fisheries.Before I actually arrived there, my take on Newfoundland and Labrador was one of utter, complete, and terrible failure. I expected to see boarded up towns, upturned carcasses of fishing boats, the headstones of a dead industry. Studying in Newfoundland would serve as my stoic reminder that the tragedy of the Newfoundland fishery could easily be repeated elsewhere, even in my sacred little corner of Alaska. With that perspective entrenched I would return to Alaska and preach from my soapbox: “It could happen here, beware!”
That never happened.
Arriving in St. John’s, Newfoundland’s capital city, in September 2005, I was excited to be realizing this fisheries “hajj,” to where, as I saw it, North American fisheries started – and died. As I settled into graduate work at the Marine Institute, I became friends with a number of people intimately familiar with Newfoundland’s fisheries. From them and from my coursework I learned – no, I was beaten over the head – that not only were Newfoundlanders & Labradoreans still fishing, but that their fisheries were thriving.
“Did you know that last year [2004] the Newfoundland fisheries were as valuable as they have ever been?” was one of the first things Glenn Blackwood, Director of the Marine Institute, told me about the region’s fisheries. Yes, in July 1992, Canada placed a moratorium on the world’s most productive and long-lasting cod fishery, and it was a tragedy of incredible scale. Virtually overnight, 50,000 Newfoundlanders lost their jobs, and the Province’s primary industry officially qualified as a social, economical, and ecological disaster of epic proportions. (I say “officially,” because warning signs were evident for those open to see them. You can read more in Dr. George Rose’s 2007 publication Cod: The Ecological History of the North Atlantic Fisheries, or any number of other relevant texts.)
Within a few years though, much of the remaining fishing effort shifted to the productive crab and shrimp fisheries, and the market for crab was booming. A decade after the fishery moratorium, one could visit an outport community and find the crab fishermen by looking for the new homes, trucks, and Ski-Doo’s. So it was fixed, right?
By the end of my first semester, I’d learned that Newfoundland and Labrador certainly weren’t dead, but the fishing industry, despite initial appearances, hadn’t healed to its former glory either. Out-migration, the departure of residents for work in mainland Canada, was high; drug use was (and is) on the rise; and many Newfoundlanders still complain of the continued attrition of their quality of life due to the failed cod fishery. Even those earning a seven-figure income from the crab and shrimp fisheries (which, by the way, are showing their own early signs of economic and social trouble), still wax poetic about the cod-fishing days of their youth. I could go on here, but in the interests of brevity please understand that the social, economical, and ecological situation in Newfoundland and Labrador, and in the surrounding waters, is not entirely well at all.
How does this very brief summary of Newfoundland and Labrador fisheries tie in with the voyage and mission of Ocean Watch? Of all human endeavors at sea, fishing is the most intimate. I imagine no activity where the interconnectedness of our lives and the life and health of the ocean are so intertwined as when fishing. Whether for subsistence, personal-use, recreation, or re-sale, the survival of a fishing family is based on what they harvest from the sea. Simple logic from this relationship dictates that if you “catch it all,” then there will be nothing left to catch tomorrow. This is brutally apparent to fishing families, and has been for thousands of years. So why the tragedy, and how do we avoid it happening again? Frankly, I don’t know the answer, but I want to, so I’ve dedicated my career to finding a tenable solution to our global fishery crisis.
And my work in Newfoundland? A few months after arriving in 2005 I met Valerie, my future spouse. I earned my graduate degree several years ago, and now Val, her son Ryan, and I live in St. John’s. I work with Dr. George Rose at the Marine Institute, researching science’s role within the fishery management decision-making process, and learning more about the interconnected lives of fishing families and the ocean.
I also found those headstones of Newfoundland and Labrador’s cod industry. Empty fish plants, rotting wharves, and rusting cod-trap mooring anchors dot Newfoundland’s shores, providing a reminder that new boats and big homes are not the only way to gauge the success of a fishery.
Check back to this website within the next few weeks for an article on fishery science and management in the North Atlantic, and a short list of further reading for those interested in North Atlantic fisheries.
- Edward Stern with photograph by David Thoreson
This crew log submitted by Iridium OpenPort and Stratos
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