ative Indians demand justice—Pg. 3

a 2c///c Tribune

15

Vol. 34, No. 20

FRIDAY, MAY 18, 1973

FISHERMEN SAY:

By SEAN GRIFFIN
In a historic move following the breakdown of negotiations between Canada and
the United States, Canada served 60 days notice May 8 that it will extend net fishing ,
beyond the surf line tothe 12 mile limit in non-convention waters and lengthen the

billnes

Un fishermen shown willbe allowed to fish out beyond present
de ty limits if the U.S. does not back down on its unacceptable

Mand

ISS for Fraser River salmon fishing rights.

—Fisherman photos

trolling season in order to increase Canada’s share of Fraser and other salmon runs.

The impasse resulted from the
U.S. adamance in demanding
rights in perpetuity to Fraser
River sockeyeand pink salmon
runs. Agreement could only
have been reached; according to
the head of the Canadian dele-
gation, C.R. Levelton, “‘if
Canada had sold out her national
interest.”’

Under the Canada-U.S. treaty
signed in 1930 and implemented
in 1938, convention waters are
defined as those between the
48th and the 49th parallels and
including the Strait of Juande
Fuca, Puget Sound and the Strait
of Georgia north to about
Sechelt.

T
of _eannouncement last week
Dice arp rise in the consumer
Ufone has added extra
at peace to the open air rally
Set fo, Couver City Hall Square
Don, Unday, May 27 at2 p.m.
Ordj pers of the rally, the Co-
Cerned Ing Committee of Con-
th Itizens, announced this
Paga tat Federal NDP MLA
Sealy fale hasagreedtobea
and Dice. that the Vancouver
Nam oy Labor Councilhad
Man or vf Rundgren as chair-
a the rally,
report Week Statistics Canada
€d that food prices had
Apri} ‘6 percent from March
Mere...’ 20d that if the rate of
Dtices © Were maintained, food
Percent Would rise almost 37
On by next March.
thr - One month in the last
lange, cats has there been a
tiga, tonthly increase in food
and July that was between June
Ane.” last year.

€Xaminat,
Show. Xamination of the figure

Ing ty gat food prices, accord-
Biss. tatistics Canada, have _

climbed 12.9 percent over the
last 12 months. Food prices
outpace all other consumer
items, andis almost double the
complete cost of living index
which climbed 6.6 percent in the
same one-year period.

In the 12 month period under
review, Statistics Canada says
that beef prices since last April

rose an average of more than 16’

percent; pork prices are nearly
30 percent higher and poultry is
up more than 26 percent. Eggs
are 43 percent higher than a year
earlier.

Meanwhile, the big food
monopolies continue to report
huge profits all across Canada. A
survey carried recently in the
Toronto Globe and Mail, based
on a sampling of 161 com-
panies, revealed that corporate
profits, after taxes, rose more
than 35 percent in the first three
months compared with the
same period in 1972. Food indus-
try profits were well ahead of
the average, up by a total of 65.4

percent for six large food chains -

included in the sampling.

The same national trend is
evident in B.C. Last week the PT
reported record - breaking
profits for Woodwards Stores of
ten million dollars. This week
Kelly, Douglas and Co., partof
the Weston chain, reported
record sales and profits for the
last year. The company oper-
ates Super-Valu stores and
Nabob Foods Ltd. Net profits
jumped by 16.5 percent toa total
of $2.9 million.

Reflecting a sensitiveness to
public protest over food
profiteering, the president of
Kelly, Douglas, Victor Mac-
Lean, defended the huge profits
of big business and said big busi-
ness is ‘‘not displaying enough
bravery in defence of the profit
system.”

Meanwhile, as profits and
prices continue to soar, the
Federal government is moving
with the speed of a snail to name
the personnel for the Food
Prices Review Board.

The first sockeye catch divi-
sion between the twocountries
—ona50-50 basis— waseffected
in 1946. The convention, ‘ad-
ministered by the International
Pacific Salmon Fisheries Com-
mission, was amended by pro-
tocol in 1956-57 toinclude Fraser
River pink salmon runs.

Waters above the 49th Parallel
are not governed by the salmon
convention but ‘‘surf lines’’ are
drawn the entire length of the
coast beyond which salmonnet
fishing is prohibited.

But the unacceptable de-

mands of the U.S. on Fraser
River and other salmonruns are
changing all that.

The Canadian position is, and
vhas been, that each country
should harvest the fish originat-
ing in its own rivers. Realizing,
however, that the stocks from
various rivers intermingle, the
negotiations between the two
countries — at. least from
Canada’s standpoint — have, as
their first objective, the reduc-
tion of interceptions of fish re-
turning .9 various rivers to
spawn.

Canada has been the loser in
efforts to balance suchintercep-
tions— between 1967 and 1972,

the Americanstook anaverage
of 1.8 million more Canadian
fish annually. The U.S. pro-
posals would have the effect of
increasing the inequity.
Canadian troll fishermen have
been intercepting chinooks and
cohos of U.S. origin but the Am-
ericans refuse to discuss these
interceptions in the same terms
as the Fraser River fishery, con-

sidering the chinook and coho:

fishery to be an entirely new one
and not to be equated with what
the Americans’ consider
‘‘historic and geographic”’
rights on the Fraser.

In addition, while the U.S.,

‘since 1938 has taken sockeye and
pink salmon worth about $150 mil-

lionat today’s prices under the
terms of the convention, its
costs— as part of the convention
program to rehabilitate the
Fraser fishery — have only
amounted to $1.1 million. Andas
was pointed out by federal
environment minister Jack
Davis in February, the U.S. has
always ‘‘dragged its feet’’ in
providing its share of the
rehabilitation cost.

But when Davis announced

last year that Canada wanted the

See FISHING, pg. 12

IN THIS ISSUE

Communist parley
maps policies to
fight monopolies

See page 7

" Pi