Question Period Note: Northern Shelf Bioregion MPA Network Action Plan

Northern Shelf Bioregion MPA Network Action Plan

Sustainability of the world’s oceans is a critical concern. Canada supports marine protected areas (MPAs) to address multiple ocean stressors and threats, as well as the development of MPA networks to enhance the effectiveness of existing and future MPAs to achieve multiple goals and objectives that no one single MPA could achieve.

An area where MPA network development is underway is in the Northern Shelf Bioregion (NSB). We support and are committed to the NSB MPA network planning process and the overall conservation objectives.

Network Action Plan
The Department supports and is committed to the NSB MPA Network planning process and the overall conservation objectives.

The Department is supportive of the Network Action Plan vision and goals, as well as the collaborative process that has been put in place with British Columbia and Indigenous partners.

Fisheries and Oceans Canada is ready to continue to work collaboratively to make required revisions to ensure that the MPA Network Action Plan can be implemented in a manner that supports marine conservation, reconciliation, and economic opportunities for coastal communities.

Marine Spatial Planning
• Marine Spatial Planning (MSP) is a process that brings together relevant authorities to better coordinate how we use and manage marine spaces to achieve ecological, economic, and social objectives in a balanced way. Its outcome is roughly equivalent of a zoning plan for the ocean space.
• The Department has launched MSP across Canada, including initiatives in five major coastal areas (Pacific North Coast; Pacific South Coast; Bay of Fundy/Scotian Shelf; Estuary and Gulf of St. Lawrence; and, Newfoundland-Labrador Shelves), to improve the management and coordination of economic and conservation activities.
• The MSP approach, in collaboration with provinces, territories, and Indigenous peoples, will be used to co-develop marine spatial plans by 2024.
• Conservation network development is a strategic approach to reaching our biodiversity conservation goals. It will be integrated into Canada’s MSP efforts to ensure that our marine ecosystems are sustainably managed and are able to support economic, social, and cultural objectives in addition to conservation objectives. Engagement for the Blue Economy Strategy highlighted areas where the MSP process may benefit from being modernized. This input is under consideration by the Department.

Marine Conservation Targets
• On December 16, 2021, the Minister of Fisheries, Oceans and the Canadian Coast Guard was directed in her mandate letter to continue to work with the Minister of Environment and Climate Change and partners to ensure Canada meets its goals to conserve 25 per cent of Canada’s ocean by 2025 (25 by 25), and 30 per cent by 2030 (30 by 30), working to halt and reverse nature loss by 2030 in Canada, achieve a full recovery for nature by 2050, and champion this goal internationally. This work will remain grounded in science, Indigenous knowledge and local perspectives.

Northern Shelf Bioregion Network Action Plan
• The Government of Canada, the Province of British Columbia and 18 First Nations are working to develop an MPA Network in the Northern Shelf Bioregion (NSB), which extends from the top of Vancouver Island (Quadra Island/Bute Inlet) and reaches north to the Canada-Alaska border. The Network Action Plan (NAP) is a collaboration between these parties.
• Implementing the draft Network as currently proposed will result in a disruption of fisheries and fisheries management practices, increased uncertainty for stock assessments, pose enforcement challenges, and increase Departmental resource needs.
• Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO) has made a concerted and repeated effort to communicate to partners that components of the action plan would be extremely challenging for DFO to implement within its current legislative and regulatory jurisdiction, without significant restructuring, and to work with partners to resolve those components.
Northern Shelf Bioregion Network Action Plan – next steps
• The Department is supportive of the NAP vision and goals. However, the complexity of the draft plan as proposed presents significant challenges for the Department to implement and for fisheries overall. The draft plan proposes an approach that is not aligned with the Department’s current methods to sustainably manage fisheries including the science necessary to support them, and for effective conservation and enforcement.
• The proposed approach reflects a management scale and approach important to some First Nations partners, who are unsatisfied with current management of marine resources in their territory and desire greater agency and control through local, area-based management and governance.
• The Department remains committed to the network process and to the Department’s priorities of Marine Conservation Targets, Reconciliation, and MSP, and seeks to work with partners to develop a forward approach for the network process.
• The Department will seek to engage through the network planning process to identify an approach to revise the draft NAP such that it provides information and recommended approaches for conservation in the NSB in a manner that can be integrated into existing management approaches.

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