Multi-million-dollar investment announced for local fishing sector

The government gave $10 million on Friday to upgrade infrastructure and improve the commercial fishery sector in Wheatley. CTV Windsor’s Bob Bellacicco reports.

Millions of dollars in funding have been announced to help boost the commercial fishing industry in Wheatley and Port Dover.

A $10-million investment by the provincial government will upgrade infrastructure and boost the region’s commercial fishery sector.

The project will see two older buildings demolished, including a 59-year-old management facility in Wheatley and a second building in Port Dover to help modernize operations.

“New infrastructure within. Modernizing data systems. Mechanical. Everything that the team needs to be able to really do their jobs to the best of their ability,” Minister of Natural Resources Mike Harris said in an announcement on Friday.

The new buildings will provide more space for field operations equipment and upgraded labs for processing samples.

The upgrades will help sustain jobs in both communities.

“It creates millions of dollars of opportunity for tourism and commercial fisheries,” said Minister of Agriculture Trevor Jones. “People that work here ensure the health and safety of our fish populations. The quality of fish in Lake Erie. They can anticipate issues, parasites, diseases, pests, things that are going to bother the fishery.”

“If you look around here just where we are now there’s some incredible processing facilities here. We’ve got a boat that just drove by. Hopefully it’s got a fresh catch coming in. It’s tens of thousands of jobs here direct and indirect across the province,” added Harris.

Harris says the Lake Erie fishery is one of the largest commercial fisheries in the world. Fish are sold across the globe including Asia and Europe.

“The pressures that are coming from the U.S. right now, it’s really important that we make sure that we open up some more of those channels. The re-investment in the community here will help us do that,” he said.

Harris feels there’s a lot of ceiling to reach for in expanding fisheries in the Great Lakes.

“Beef, pork, chicken. it’s always a revered product that we are able to offer here from Ontario and from Canada, and we really intent for our fisheries sector to be able to piggyback a lot off of that,” added Jones.

Design work for Port Dover is almost complete with tendering to begin soon, whereas Wheatley is a year behind. Harris says there is no timeline for completion but ideally, he’d like both building done as soon as possible.