Fisheries authorities in Nova Scotia are considering the possibility of a jellyfish fishery in Eastern Canada.
Answering questions in front of a legislative committee in December, Scott Hosking, the director of business development for the Nova Scotia Department of Fisheries, said there is enough demand from Asia to support the creation of a jellyfish fishery in his province.
“We’re looking at actually some of the species that haven’t traditionally been harvested in the past. This isn’t in any particular order - things like jellyfish,” Hosking said. “The Chinese have no jellyfish left, so they’re looking to us to explore if it’s a possibility for here.”
The environmental community immediately denounced the idea. Kathleen Martin, executive director of the Canadian Sea Turtle Network, feared the impact on the endangered leatherback sea turtle, which federal regulation considers an at-risk species.
"China is a huge market. The idea they have fished out other sources for jellyfish, that they have to look other places to provide them, should be chilling to us. It's not sustainable, clearly. If it were, they would not have to do that," Martin said.
Bycatch and ecosystems management are other concerns of marine scientists in the area, according to Susanna Fuller, of the Halifax-based Ecology Action Centre.
"When we start to fish the jellyfish, that's the bottom, bottom of the food chain,” Fuller said. “I really think before any of that discussion happens and a new fishery starts to be developed, we need to flip the switch in Canada and have an ecosystem approach to fisheries management that takes into account 'What does the ocean need to continue to thrive?'"
Around the world, more than a million metric tons of jellyfish are harvested for commercial use annually. Outside of Asia, jellyfish are being fished in Mexico, Ecuador, and in the United States in the Gulf of Mexico and in North Carolina.
There has also been substantial study into jellyfish by researchers at prominent universities in the United States and Canada, as well as in Europe. Studies have found that in the Mediterranean, jellyfish play a major role in the diets of bluefin tuna and swordfish. Norwegian research found that marine creatures classified as ocean scavengers relied heavily on dead jellyfish. And in Atlantic Canada, jellyfish are the primary food source for the 1,000 leatherbacks who summer in local waters.
The leatherback’s plight has the potential to end of the jellyfish fishery before it starts. In February, a dead leatherback turtle was found in Cape Breton’s Bras d’Or Lakes. It was believed to have followed a jellyfish bloom and failed to find its way back to the ocean. A necropsy performed at the Canadian Wildlife Cooperative in Charlottetown found the 360-kilogram turtle (about the size of a grand piano) was emaciated.
Canada’s Department of Fisheries and Oceans is responsible both for approving and regulating any new commercial fishery, as well as for protecting the leatherback sea turtle. With the DFO entangled in delicate efforts to increase protections for the endangered North Atlantic right whale, the agency’s approval for a jellyfish fishery may be difficult to obtain.
“Any consideration of a new fishery would include impacts on listed species under the Species at Risk Act,” a spokesperson for the DFO told SeafoodSource.
