The new president of Saskatchewan Co-operative Fisheries Ltd. says he wants more help coming from the province as fishers confront some tough challenges.
Gordon Stomp was elected to his new post at the fishers’ annual meeting in Prince Albert over the weekend.
Stomp says the fishers are in a bind right now as they try to find new markets for their fish, now that they are out from under the monopoly of the Freshwater Fish Marketing Corporation.
At the same time, he says they’ve been told they can’t sell their fish to provinces like Alberta or Manitoba because of the agreement that exists between those provinces and the FFMC.
Stomp says he would like the provincial government to talk to other provinces, like Alberta, about that situation and help the fishers address a number of other issues:
“I’m really disappointed with the province. They’ve essentially abandoned the commercial fishing industry. The last terrible thing they did — was do away with the transportation subsidies. The reasoning they did, and how they came up with the reasons for doing it; it just doesn’t make sense at all.”
Stomp says provincial officials have indicated the subsidy was tied to the FFMC monopoly, but he says that was never the intent.
He says the subsidy’s purpose was to help the fishers get their product to market and it was an arrangement between the harvesters and the province, not the FFMC.
Stomp adds the transition hasn’t been easy:
“Yeah, the transition — we had hoped the industry would attract an investor or two and it hasn’t happened yet so the transition is a lot longer and lot more complicated than we had previously envisioned.”
He adds fishers have talked with a U.S. businessman who has expressed interest in buying fish and those talks are still ongoing.