March/April 1997
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March/April 1997 |
In the November-December 1996 issue of Focus, an article by John M. Cooley and Charles K. Minns, "We Need to Broaden the Great Lakes Ecosystem Approach Despite Budget and Staff Cuts," argued that pursuing an ecosystem approach to Great Lakes water quality means that morefocus should be placed on factors other than chemical hazards, specifically habitat, exotic species and other biological management issues. We invited other perspectives and the article below presents an alternative view.
The International Joint Commission has tended to emphasize the virtual elimination of persistent toxic substances. It also, however, has promoted an ecosystemic approach to Great Lakes issues that considers any factor that can significantly affect water quality, or that can be affected by it, to be a legitimate area of enquiry and attention. Even so, the debate is not simply a matter of choosing between virtual elimination and a broader approach to ecosystem preservation. It also involves which specific topics should receive emphasis within the larger context. While the Commission has encouraged Governments to maintain their support for vital research efforts in a number of different areas, the ability to address any of these thoroughly comes more into question as resources become more scarce. Thus priorities will need to be set. For this reason, we believe that this debate is important.
by James Ludwig
Drs. Cooley and Minns are to be forgiven for their interpretation of the ecosystem approach; they and others who subscribe to this interpretation are the victims of a clever sleight of hand that occurred in the late 1970s and early 1980s. In 1978, the International Joint Commission published a report prepared by the Science Advisory Board. It stated that the traditional water quality approach, based on objectives for ambient water quality and standards for effluent discharges, did not take account of the interconnectedness of the various sources, such as incinerators and chemical waste dump sites as well as effluents, of transboundary water pollutants to the Great Lakes. Nor did the approach take account of the ways that pollutants moved between environmental media such as air, land and sediments, and how they bioaccumulated in food chains to levels that were toxic to top predators. To overcome these deficiencies they recommended "The Ecosystem Approach."
At the same time, fisheries researchers were considering the various stresses that could change the status of fish populations. These stresses included overfishing, the introduction of exotic species and eutrophication. They concluded that they could not distinguish the specific cause of changes in the status of fish stocks. They thus advocated that fisheries managers should manage all potential stresses in attempting to restore the depleted Great Lakes fish stocks. They called this advice to management "The Ecosystem Approach." This was eventually incorporated into the Strategic Plan for Ontario Fisheries and accepted by the Ontario Cabinet, and subsequently endorsed by the Great Lakes Fishery Commission in the Strategy for Great Lakes Fisheries Management Plan.
Thus there are two "Ecosystem Approaches." One is a multimedia approach to Great Lakes trans-boundary pollution endorsed by the International Joint Commission; the other is a multicausal approach of fisheries agencies to the unknown cause of changes in fish populations. To fisheries scientists, the specific cause tends to be not only unknown but unknowable.
Since the signing of the first Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement in 1972, the International Joint Commission has received its biological advice only from fisheries biologists. Only in 1996 did the Commission appoint to the Science Advisory Board a biologist with wildlife training. There is a consensus within the fisheries agencies that it is not necessary to consider toxic contaminants, directly or indirectly, in understanding the status of Great Lakes fish populations. Thus the advice that the Commission has received over the first 24 years of the Agreement did not include damage to fish populations caused by pollutants, only advice on the use of fish based on health advisories.
Fisheries science is about to enter a period of intellectual crisis. Environmental scientists from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in Duluth, Minnesota have undertaken a retrospective "risk assessment" of a sediment core from Lake Ontario. Through radio dating the layers of the core they have been able to reconstruct the history of contamination of Lake Ontario with specific pollutants. Lake Ontario is particularly interesting from a toxicological standpoint because it is one of the only large lakes in the world into which large quantities of 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin have been discharged. At the same time that the radio dating was being undertaken, toxicologists were finding that the eggs of lake trout are among the most sensitive of all vertebrates tested to this dioxin. Based on the amounts of dioxin in the layers of the sediment core and the amount that would be expected in the eggs corresponding to each layer, the scientists concluded that none of the lake trout eggs in Lake Ontario could have hatched since 1940. The Lake Ontario lake trout went extinct by the early 1950s and its prey, the deepwater sculpin, was extinct within about five years.
This retrospective analysis is challenging the fisheries scientists consensus that there is no need to consider the action of toxic contaminants in understanding the dynamics of fish populations in the Great Lakes. The crisis will mean that the entire body of knowledge about Great Lakes fisheries that has accumulated over the past century will have to be reevaluated in the light of this new evidence. Unfortunately, the existing consensus among fisheries agencies has made their toxicology programs particularly vulnerable to government cutbacks. And the loss of financial resources and experienced personnel will make this task of reevaluation of the evidence even more difficult.
Meanwhile, the International Joint Commission should continue on its present course pursuant to the text of the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement, which is primarily oriented towards advising the United States and Canadian governments of the injury caused by persistent toxic substances to fish, wildlife and humans and of the best means for implementing their policy on the virtual elimination of discharges of persistent toxic substances.
The protection and restoration of fish and wildlife habitat, and the prevention of the introduction of exotic species are important topics that must be addressed. There are, however, local and national, as well as other international organizations, that are directly responsible for these other Great Lakes issues. For example, the Great Lakes Fishery Commission, the Great Lakes Commission and the respective Coast Guards are responsible for various aspects involving research and control of the introduction of exotic species. Similarly, the Great Lakes Fishery Commission and the fish and wildlife agencies in the various jurisdictions are the appropriate organizations to address the management of fish and wildlife resources and to protect and restore fish and wildlife habitat. There is no necessity to invoke the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement or the International Joint Commission in all Great Lakes issues.
The confusion and damage that has been done to the various research, monitoring, regulatory and remedial programs through the original sleight of hand has been incalculable. The Commissioners should investigate the circumstances of this ambiguity and advise the parties to the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement accordingly.
James Ludwig is the president of the environmental consulting firm SERE Group Limited in Kingsville, Ontario.
Revised: April 14, 1997
Maintained by Kevin McGunagle,
mcgunaglek@ijc.wincom.net