A Debate Brewing on Overfishing and Immigration

March 10, 2008 at 8:07 pm

There is quite a debate brewing in Alaska spurred by an Alaskan resident who was “in possession of 288 salmon and 70 rainbow trout above the limit”. My understanding, based on the comments following the story that this resident is also an immigrant from another country. The story was covered in the Anchorage Daily News,Ice fisherman issued $7,270 fine.

One can understand the frustration surrounding this blatant disregard for fish, regulations and others livelihood and recreation. I have written about immigration and fishing in the past but within the context of urbanization and changing demographics in our cities. I have argued that people are becoming more alienated from our natural environment and that new immigrants would like to get out and experience true Canada but don’t have the opportunity to do so in sprawling urban centres like Vancouver or Toronto. Fishing is one of those activities that urban dwellers (immigrants and non-immigrants [whatever that means in Canada?]) can participate in to truly understand Canada and get connected to their natural environment and food sources. This is another discussion…from my perspective there is blatant overfishing from immigrants and non-immigrants alike. If there are certain people that have a hard time understanding our regulations (due to language or other barriers) we have a responsibility to educate them and make attempts to present things in ways that work for them. I think the Yukon does this well with fishing regulations in english, german and french.  The Wilderness Tourism Association of the Yukon goes even farther coming up with No Trace Camping/Canoeing signage and promotional material using pictures not english for exactly this reason.

Don’t get me wrong, people new to the country, territory, town or to a lake need to be pro-active and understand the regs..  At the end of the day if an attempt has been made to educate or present things in an easy to understand way and they have failed to inquire about the regs…throw the book at them. In this case $7K may be too lean, 200+ fish is ridiculous and beyond ignorant. In this case, I think they should have taken the truck as well. 

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