Globally, lobsters are one of the most economically valuable wild species caught in capture fisheries. Catches are dominated by American lobster (Homarus americanus) landed entirely in Atlantic Canada and northeastern United States. In Atlantic Canada, lobster fishing and marine finfish aquaculture take place in the same coastal waters creating the potential for negative environmental, as well as social, interactions. We review the state of knowledge of environmental interactions between American lobster, their habitat and fishery, and marine finfish aquaculture. We first provide a brief overview of key biological, behavioural, and ecological processes and environmental stressors of American lobster at different life-history stages followed by an overview of the pathways of effects of marine finfish aquaculture on coastal ecosystems in general and on American lobster. Our review found that certain finfish aquaculture-lobster interactions have received considerable study (e.g., chemical use), whereas knowledge of other interactions are either limited (e.g., net pens, waste discharges) or lacking (e.g., disease, noise, lights, and odours). An ecosystem-based approach to aquaculture has been proposed for managing these interactions but implementing this approach has proven to be a challenge in part because of complex multi-sector, multi-stakeholder and multi-agency governance issues. While governance solutions await development, practical measures based on the results of scientific research identified in this review, such as better use of existing oceanographic and bathymetric data, habitat and human impact assessment tools, and toxicity information offer regulators ample information and management tools, at least at the farm- and bayscale, to avoid negative finfish aquaculture-lobster interactions in Atlantic Canada. Bridging the governance gap will likely require new community-based management models that more effectively identify, generate, and integrate local community and fisher knowledge and concerns.

Commercial fish harvesters are one of the primary users of marine forecasts, and rely heavily on these reports to manage weather hazards in their work at sea. Despite the intrinsic user-producer connection between forecasters and fish harvesters, there are minimal opportunities for these groups to interact directly. The article draws from findings from a qualitative, partnership-based study conducted in Atlantic Canada on the role of marine forecasts in fishing safety. Lobster fishing is an economically lucrative sector in Atlantic Canada, in which the opening day of the commercial season is particularly hazardous. ‘Weather briefings’ are a co-managed decision-making process held immediately prior to planned lobster opening dates, in which harvesters collectively decide if anticipated weather conditions warrant a delay in the season opening. Weather briefings are notable as the sole existing channel where meteorologists and fish harvesters come into direct contact with one another. Meteorologists play a key role in the briefings insofar as they directly inform harvesters’ decisions whether to delay the season. The findings highlight how these interactions represent a form of co-produced weather knowledge between lobster harvesters, forecasters, and managers, which can support fishing safety via broader fishing co-management processes.

Increasingly, fisheries researchers and managers seek or are compelled to “bridge” Indigenous knowledge systems with Western scientific approaches to understanding and governing fisheries. Here, we move beyond the all-too-common narrative about integrating or incorporating (too often used as euphemisms for assimilating) other knowledge systems into Western science, instead of building an ethic of knowledge coexistence and complementarity in knowledge generation using Two-Eyed Seeing as a guiding framework. Two-Eyed Seeing (Etuaptmumk in Mi’kmaw) embraces “learning to see from one eye with the strengths of Indigenous knowledges and ways of knowing, and from the other eye with the strengths of mainstream knowledges and ways of knowing, and to use both these eyes together, for the benefit of all,” as envisaged by Elder Dr. Albert Marshall. In this paper, we examine the notion of knowledge dichotomies and imperatives for knowledge coexistence and draw parallels between Two-Eyed Seeing and other analogous Indigenous frameworks from around the world. It is set apart from other Indigenous frameworks in its explicit action imperative— central to Two-Eyed Seeing is the notion that knowledge transforms the holder and that the holder bears a responsibility to act on that knowledge. We explore its operationalization through three Canadian aquatic and fisheries case-studies that co-develop questions, document and mobilize knowledge, and co-produce insights and decisions. We argue that Two-Eyed Seeing provides a pathway to a plural coexistence, where time-tested Indigenous knowledge systems can be paired with, not subsumed by, Western scientific insights for an equitable and sustainable future.

This paper seeks to outline the normative beliefs that fish harvesters in two communities in rural Newfoundland -Twillingate and Fogo Island, have about their economic lives. These beliefs have the potential to substantively affect communities’ engagement with resource governance and regulatory policies. Specifically, this paper examines three sets of beliefs. The first is how harvesters view the relationship between the resources they extract and the towns those resources sustain. The second looks at when inequality is acceptable or unacceptable in these communities. The third concerns the circumstances under which people should be able to buy or sell their right to harvest a resource. This paper uses 21 interviews with fish harvesters in Twillingate and Fogo Island, as well as evidence from previous anthropological and economic studies, to examine the harvesters’ normative beliefs and what impact they might have on policies and policymakers.

The coronavirus pandemic, which started in late 2019, is one of the devastating crises that has affected human lives and the economies of many countries across the globe. Though economies have been affected, some sectors (such as food and fisheries sectors) are more vulnerable and prone to the deleterious impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. This paper highlights the various disruptions (safety at workplace, loss of harvest and processing activity, loss of export opportunities and income) faced by the Newfoundland and Labrador fisheries due to several restrictive measures (especially on mobility, social distancing, quarantine, and, in extreme cases, lockdown) to curtail the spread of the virus. Additionally, this paper makes a case that Newfoundland and Labrador fisheries can be managed sustainably during and after the pandemic by suggesting practical recommendations borrowed from two sustainability frameworks (Canadian Fisheries Research Network and the EU Setting the Right Safety Net framework) for managing fisheries in Canada and the European Union.