North Coast Herring season faces significant closure for 2019

Fishing boats unloading at Canadian Fish earlier this year, according to
the Metlakatla Aquatic Resources office, 2019's herring season will
see a major change for the Prince Rupert area  

A November notice from the Department of Fisheries and Oceans will have a significant impact on the local fishery come herring season, with the Metlakatla Aquatic Resources office outlining some of the details when it comes to the harvesting of herring in the year ahead.

According to Metlakatla, the notice has indicated that there will be no gill net or seine herring fishery for Prince Rupert, something that would clearly impact not only on the boat crews that take to the North Pacific waters, but also on the employment prospects for shore-workers at fish plants in the community.

The notice goes on to indicate that there will be a spawn-on-Kelp fishery, one up to a maximum of 1,000 tons. DFO is continuing to monitor the status of the stock levels and may announce an even lower harvest rate to avoid dropping below the Limit Reference Point if required.

The background of the DFO notice was posted to the Metlakatla Aquatic Resources Facebook page on November 28th, you can review it below:

In past years, a healthy Herring season would generate a large number of employment opportunities for local workers, from boat crews, to fish plant workers who would not only freeze the herring, but pop the roe locally and then have it shipped to global markets from the Prince Rupert facilities.

The spin off effects a significant boost to the local economy as well, with supplies and repairs for both fishing fleet and plants on the North Coast.

Change has been a frequent companion for the herring fishery in the region in recent years, with elements of plant based employment transferred to lower mainland locations, as frozen herring was shipped by truck after truck to those facilities,  something which resulted in reduced working hours for local fish plant  employees.

The ongoing struggles of fish stocks and industry retrenchment has made for troubled times for the local fishing industry for much of the last decade.

You can review more of the background on the North Coast Fishery from our archive page here.