Pacific oyster fishery
The following profile provides the socioeconomic context of the Pacific oyster fishery in British Columbia. It includes an overview of the commercial sector. This overview is based on data collected from DFO commercial harvest logbooks and sale slips, public reports, and DFO surveys on harvest prices.
Long text version
2024 Economic profile of the wild Pacific oyster fishery
Commercial fisheries overview
The commercial wild Pacific oyster fishery is minimal in comparison to the aquaculture harvest of oyster. The fishery operates under a Total Allowable Catch (TAC) and individual licence quotas. The earliest data available for commercial wild Pacific oyster harvest is from 2014, when the hail program officially started with DFO. Over the last decade (2014-2024), hailed landings have averaged 156,282 lbs. For more information about oyster aquaculture, please refer to the Pacific Region Shellfish Integrated Management of Aquaculture Plan (2017).
All values are from 2024 compared to 2023 in 2024-dollars by calendar year, unless otherwise specified.
Key metrics for the wild Pacific oyster fishery, all values are from 2024 and in 2024 dollars:
- Landed value ($838.7K), increased by 38% since 2023
- Licence eligibilities (62, no change since 2023), with 14 communal commercial licences. Licence eligibilities represents the number of issued licences.
- Price ($5.90/lb) in 2024
Annual wild Pacific oyster landings (in pounds) by calendar year
Total hailed landings (in lbs)
- 2014 – 184K lbs
- 2015 – 209K lbs
- 2016 – 236K lbs
- 2017 – 184K lbs
- 2018 – 164K lbs
- 2019 – 181K lbs
- 2020 – 111K lbs
- 2021 – 91K lbs
- 2022 – 98K lbs
- 2023 – 118K lbs
- 2024 – 142K lbs
Fishing season is different from calendar year and runs from March 1 to February 28 of the following year.
Landed value trends are not provided as there is limited price data.
Commercial fishery wild pacific oyster - 2024 landed weight map
- East Coast Vancouver Island (132.5K lbs in total volume)
- West Coast Vancouver Island (9.6K lbs in total volume)
Exports: In 2024, B.C. exported a total of 1,313 metric tons of oysters (wild and aquaculture), down 5% from 2023. The demand for oyster is mainly in the USA (87%), followed by overseas markets in Singapore (5%), Hong Kong (3%), and others (5%).
Wild Pacific oysters are harvested whole as both the meat and shell have value.
The wild Pacific oyster fishery directly contributes $447.3K (GDP) to the provincial economy, with a direct income contribution of $291.6K.
There is a lack of data to support the inclusion of employment information.
Data
The commercial data that informed this work can be downloaded here.
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