By Jesse Zeman
BCWF Executive Director
We sometimes forget why it’s so great to be Canadian.
Our water, parks, fish, and wildlife are owned by all Canadians, managed only in trust by the government on our behalf.
We are able to sustainably access Crown land to hike, swim, camp, forage, fish, and hunt. That is not true everywhere. In other parts of the world, natural lands and waters suitable for citizens are private and only accessible by royalty, landowners, the rich, and their friends.
While the concept of common property resources dates back thousands of years, the framework for Canada’s public lands was shaped 800 years ago. It came about because England’s King John attempted to privatize waterways and access to fish, making them inaccessible to common folk. Eventually, the King’s tyranny was overthrown, and he was forced to sign the Magna Carta, which re-established waterways and fisheries were not the property of the ruler, but resources held in common for the public.
Thus, we learned long ago that concentrating ownership or privatizing public resources is a terrible idea. Despite those hard-won lessons, we are seeing a gradual erosion of access to parks, fish, water, and wildlife, and the very spirit of common property resources in Canada.
We see it in the growing sense that natural resources are no longer something we share, but something we compete for—or that we are excluded from entirely. Across the country, Canadians are being barred from accessing Crown land, parks, water, fish and wildlife. DFO is already making decisions as though salmon are not publicly owned. This is alarming.
In 1999, without any outside pressure the Government of Canada confirmed that salmon should be described as Common Property in the Salmon Allocation Policy. It was a rare but clear declaration of principle that explicitly meant salmon are not owned by a privileged group, not owned by the government, nor by an industry. Salmon are owned by all Canadians, and the federal government’s role is to manage them fairly, transparently and in trust for all Canadians. This is a policy anchor that sets the tone for DFO decision making and management.
Our federal government is now considering changes to Canada’s Salmon Allocation Policy that would remove the description of salmon as Common Property. DFO says that removing the Common Property Resource language will make no difference to the public fishery or public ownership. But if it makes no difference, why remove it at all?
As DFO overhauls its Salmon Allocation Policy, Common Property is being attacked as a “colonial concept.” But Common Property is literally the opposite of colonial – it describes communal ownership by and responsibility for all Canadians.
Public ownership is true democracy in action.
Either all Canadians own salmon or they don’t. Privatization turns a shared inheritance into a controlled asset. Access becomes conditional. Rights concentrate. Decisions become driven by money, influence, and exclusivity rather than stewardship.
When access disappears, public support disappears. And when public support disappears, the fish disappear. Anglers who don’t have opportunity to harvest fish are alienated from the resource, and with that goes millions of dollars in fees they pay from their own wallets, and hundreds of thousands of hours of volunteer time currently dedicated to conservation, restoring habitat, and running hatcheries.
Once access is lost, it rarely returns.
This isn’t just about salmon. It’s about whether Canada remains a country where public resources are managed in trust for everyone, or a country where the public is slowly fenced out.
In 1999, Canada sent a clear signal to Canadians: salmon are a Common Property Resource. To even entertain abandoning it from the policy now is a clear signal that the Government of Canada does not value public ownership like it once did.
Join us and speak up for Canadians before it is too late.
Visit fishingrights.ca or bcwf.bc.ca/salmon to contact your MP and the Fisheries Minister.
Jesse Zeman is the Executive Director of the B.C. Wildlife Federation, B.C.’s largest conservation organization.