Sablefish has been harvested off the west coast of British Columbia, Canada for more than 40 years. The Japanese distant water fishing fleet targeted Pacific sablefish for over a decade before foreign fishing was extinguished with the adoption of Canada’s 200 mile in 1977.

Sablefish was caught as a bycatch in domestic groundfish fisheries where it was viewed as a nuisance fish because of the low landed price paid by local processors. In the late 1970’s several Canadian fishermen attempted to establish a viable sablefish fishery by pursuing oversees markets in Japan and experimenting with trap gear as a more effective and productive harvesting method.

With increased market demand and escalating trap and longline fishing effort, in 1981 the Canadian Department of Fisheries and Oceans took steps to limit entry to the sablefish fishery. The implementation of limited entry resulted in 48 vessels receiving sablefish (Category "K") licenses issued annually by DFO. The fishery was managed by opening on a specified date and then closing the fishery when the Department estimated that the TAC (Total Allowable Catch) was taken.  Under this management approach the fishery became shorter and shorter, shrinking to a mere 14 days in 1989 from 245 days in 1981, despite a 42% increase in the TAC.

As the openings became shorter it was more difficult for fishery managers to estimate fishing power and catching capacity and TAC overages became more pronounced.  Both the CSA and DFO were concerned that the growing difficulties of maintaining the annual harvest within the TAC would lead to stock declines and threaten long-term sablefish resource sustainability.  Individual Vessel Quota (IVQ) management was implemented in the Canadian sablefish fishery in 1990 with the support of the CSA.

IVQ management involves allocating shares of the TAC to each licensed vessel and is an attempt to overcome the problems associated with "common property" fisheries. In a "common property" environment, fishermen compete for a share of the available catch. There is a compelling incentive for each fisherman to continually increase their ability to compete, primarily by investing in boats that can catch and hold more fish. Under such a regime, conservation is always everyone else’s problem as the individual fisherman races to catch as much as he can before the fishery closes.

 Under IVQ management, conservation becomes a tangible concern to each fisherman because the value of their investment is measured in the health of the resource, not in their immediate catch. If an individual sablefish fisherman exceeds his vessel’s annual allocation, he will receive less in the following year. Wasteful fishing practices by one fisherman that potentially affects the overall health of the sablefish resource will have a direct negative impact on other sablefish fishermen and will mobilize opposition and corrective action. IVQs remove the incentive for a fisherman to invest in the hope of increasing his catch share. The incentive, under IVQ management, becomes maximizing net income from a specific quantity of fish (the annual share allocated to each vessel). With the "race for fish" eliminated, fishermen have more control over factors that effect the value of the fish, such as seasonal supply and quality.

IVQ management has also been the focal point for significant improvements in co-management in the sablefish fishery. The Canadian Sablefish Association and the Department of Fisheries and Oceans both share the same primary objective – the proper care and management of the sablefish resource. Both groups also agree that the realization of this shared objective means that there must be sufficient resources available to carry out the necessary biological research and assessment work and for the monitoring, enforcement, administration and management of the fishery.

For more information about  co-management in the sablefish fishery and the operational management requirements, please click on the Co-management and Management Plan links.