Making fishing, hunting and trapping a national priority
Twelve fishing and hunting organizations from across Canada have joined together today to officially announce a new initiative called the National Fishing and Hunting Collaborative (NFHC).
The NFHC is a group of non-partisan, non-profit fishing and hunting organizations that will work collaboratively to provide national leadership on important conservation issues and a voice for more than 375,000 Canadians from coast to coast to coast.
The NFHC’s key objectives will be public and political advocacy to ensure all Canadians recognize and better understand the heritage value and modern relevance of fishing, hunting and trapping.
“The affiliate organizations of the NFHC have a long history of working together and have enjoyed some successes over the years, but we felt this collaborative could demonstrate greater national unity and a stronger presence on core fishing, hunting, and trapping issues,” says OFAH executive director, Angelo Lombardo.
To kick-start this advocacy, the NFHC has launched a pre-election campaign to engage the major federal political parties on issues important to the outdoors community. The NFHC has identified promotion of fishing, hunting, and trapping, firearms policy, chronic wasting disease, conservation funding, and aquatic invasive species as the National 5 top priorities for the next Government of Canada to tackle.
“By working together, we are making it more difficult for political parties and the next federal government to ignore or dismiss our issues,” Lombardo explains. “We have created one of the largest stakeholder groups in the nation, representing millions of Canadians and billions of dollars for the economy. We feel it’s high time our interests get the recognition they deserve on Parliament Hill.”
For more information about who is involved in the NFHC, and to view political party responses to our National 5 priorities as they become available, please visit www.ofah.org/nfhc.
Contact: Matt DeMille, OFAH Manager of Fish and WIldlife Services — 705-748-6324 or matt_demille@ofah.org.
