Experts to probe health of Canadian oceans

Larry Pynn
November 26, 2009
The Vancouver Sun 

An independent panel of scientists is embarking on a comprehensive report of the health of Canada's oceans, with special emphasis on climate change and marine biodiversity.

Panel chairman Jeff Hutchings, a Dalhousie University biology professor, said in an interview that Canada has a moral and geographic responsibility to care for its oceans, given that it has the longest coastline in the world.

"People tend not to focus on the oceans, but on the land-based issues," he said of the climate-change debate. "Things in the oceans belong to all Canadians, not specific groups or companies, and that lends a sense of stewardship to what happens in the oceans."

Announcement of the report Thursday, sponsored by the Royal Society of Canada, precedes next month's United Nations climate change conference in Copenhagen, Denmark.

Hutchings said the report would provide a source of education and information about oceans, with recommendations to Ottawa on how to improve the oceans' health into the future.

Hutchings is also chairman of the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada, a scientific body that recommends to Ottawa species that should be listed as at risk.

The committee has identified 29 marine fish and 33 marine mammals at risk in Canada — including southern resident killer whales, basking sharks, and abalone — although not all have been accepted by Ottawa to date.

Of 10 scientists on the panel, one is from each of the U.S. and Britain, and the other eight from Canada, including three from B.C.: Brian Riddell, a former federal fisheries scientist, now chief executive officer of the Pacific Salmon Foundation; and two from Simon Fraser University, marine biologist Isabelle Cete, and Randall Peterman, Canada research chairman in fisheries risk assessment and management.

The panel, expected to report back in 2012, plans to address broader issues than the recently announced federal judicial inquiry into the collapse of Fraser River sockeye runs. 

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