Tag Archives: DFO

Indigenous Nations, Rivers & Oceans

‘I wish we had our territory back’: Influx of float homes in Clayoquot Sound forces Tla-o-qui-aht families to go farther for traditional foods

By Nora O’Malley, Ha-Shilth-Sa, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

This is article is part of a series of stories on Nuu-chah-nulth clam gardens.

Clayoquot Sound, B.C. – From the captain’s seat of his fishing boat called ‘La Fortune’, Tla-o-qui-aht First Nation (TFN) fisherman Leo Jon Manson popped the lid off the proverbial can of worms labelled ‘float homes’. 

Float homes are encroaching cultural and harvesting sites in Tla-o-qui-aht territory, says Manson. One spot in particular, Lemmens Inlet, a protected body of water located just north of Tofino that cuts into Meares Island, has succumbed to the region’s “laidback” regulations on float homes.

“We still have some spots in our territory, but we have to travel farther away from Opitsaht or Načiks (Tofino). We have to go farther back in the inlets. Our local grounds are gone, pretty much,” Manson said.

Continue reading ‘I wish we had our territory back’: Influx of float homes in Clayoquot Sound forces Tla-o-qui-aht families to go farther for traditional foods →
Cost of Climate Change, Rivers & Oceans

Fisheries and Oceans Canada expects to flounder under mounting climate costs

Canada’s National Observer, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

Hurricane Fiona left a trail of destruction across the Atlantic Coast in September 2022 wreaking havoc on wharves, fisheries, vessels, and gear and the federal government’s pocketbook.

In response to the climate disaster, Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO) has had to earmark more than $563 million to deal with Fiona’s aftermath, including damage to 142 out of 184 small craft harbours on the Atlantic coast.

However, internal communications obtained by Canada’s National Observer suggest that Hurricane Fiona was just a harbinger of escalating climate-related costs and operational threats DFO expects to face in the coming years. With a shrinking budget, the department is bracing for more severe financial and logistical challenges as the climate crisis intensifies.

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Rivers & Oceans

Salmon Farms: Scientific Methodology, ‘Activist Science’ and Corporate Spin

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The Salmon Farming industry appears to be using labels like ‘activist science’ and ‘independent science’ to discredit inconvenient research without engaging its findings. 

Brian Kingzett, the Executive Director of the BC Salmon Farmers Association, recently informed the city of Campbell River that: 

“ We have seen a weaponization of science where industry and government have their science, industry science is always put into conflict. Then we see ‘activist science,’ which is largely coming out of urban areas  being weaponized against us. We need that ‘independent science’ more than ever.” 

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Rivers & Oceans

Federal ministers sued over lack of action on endangered orcas

Canada’s National Observer, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

For a second time, the world watched as Tahlequah, an endangered southern resident killer whale, struggled to keep her dead newborn calf afloat in the Salish Sea.

But with Ottawa failing to take urgent action to protect the 73 remaining orcas, a coalition of environmental groups is suing two federal ministers to push them to assume their legal responsibility and recommend an emergency order to save the West Coast icons.

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Cost of Climate Change

Feds release flimsy first report on climate risk managment

Canada’s National Observer, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

The federal government expects the cost of disaster relief funding to balloon to a billion dollars or more each year as the climate crisis advances, according to a new risk-management report. 

The document, examining steps by the federal public service to manage the financial risks and possible rewards tied to climate change, was released by Minister of Finance Dominic LeBlanc on Monday. 

Over the past decade, the federal government spent an average $793 million annually to help provinces and farms, businesses, industries and communities overcome natural disasters, according to the inaugural Federal Climate-Related Risk Management report. 

However, as extreme weather and catastrophes aggravated by climate change — like the 2021 flooding in B.C. or Hurricane Fiona in Atlantic Canada the following year — occur more frequently, funding transfers to provinces through the Disaster Financial Assistance Arrangement (DFAA) are expected to spike, the report noted. 

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