Northwest Atlantic Fisheries Organization (NAFO) said that the cod spawning stock on the southern Grand Banks (3NO) have increased 69 percent since 2007. Dr. Robert Rangeley, the vice-president of the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) Canada, Atlantic Canada said that the cod spawning stock in 3PO went from 7500 tonnes in 2007 to 12,700 tones in 2010 which is still far below historic cod levels in that area.
he added that NAFO manage southern Grand Banks cod and have been under a moratorium since 1994. He noted that the stock has never really had a good chance to recover because of the by-catches of cod in the zone since that time. He informed that WWF is calling on NAFO to set a recovery plan in place and put in mandatory measures to reduce the by-catch.
NAFO in its statement said that its committed to follow fish stock agreements as all contracting parties to the organization are signatories to the United Nations Fish Stocks Agreement so they are obligated to work towards the recovery of fish stocks. Dr. Jeff Hutchings is a biologist at Dalhousie University in Halifax and has been studying cod populations for a number of years.
Hutchings said that Canada needs to do several things to help the recovery of cod stocks.
He said that the political will in Canada to seriously address the cod stocks is lacking. he also noted that people, in national sense, are not engaged in the fishery, and when the general public is not engaged, politicians are not going to have their feet held to the fire.
