A Crab Fishery Without a Published Fishing Map

There is something rather remarkable about an international fishing dispute in which governments can argue over a resource before the public has even been shown exactly where the fishing would take place.

That is where the latest Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon snow-crab controversy stands.

Following French President Emmanuel Macron's September 2026 visit to the islands, reports emerged of a promised exploratory fishing licence for ASPM Océan, a Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon fishing company. The proposed operation would permit up to 1,500 tonnes of snow crab annually for five years on the Tail of the Grand Banks, in NAFO area 3LNO.²³

Although that identifies the general fishing region, no precise operational coordinates or authorized fishing boundaries have been verified.

Newfoundland and Labrador's political leaders and federal fisheries officials challenged the idea almost immediately.

But another revealing detail may be found in an existing French government document.

On April 24, 2026, France established a total allowable catch of just 262 tonnes for its regulated snow-crab fishery in French-jurisdiction waters within NAFO subdivision 3Ps around Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon.²

The previous year's limit had been 442 tonnes.³

The proposed 1,500-tonne annual exploratory operation would therefore represent approximately 5.7 times the entire established French 2026 snow-crab quota.

That comparison does not establish whether the proposed catch would be sustainable. The two operations could involve different grounds, stocks and biological circumstances. Nor does a total allowable catch tell us how much crab was actually landed.

It does, however, demonstrate the scale of what has been suggested.

More importantly, the legal authority behind the proposed new fishery remains unestablished in the public record.

And that leads directly to a maritime argument stretching back more than three decades.

The 1992 Arbitration: What France Actually Received

On June 10, 1992, an international arbitration tribunal delivered its decision concerning the maritime boundary between Canada and France around Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon.⁴

The French islands sit immediately south of Newfoundland, surrounded by maritime areas in which Canada has extensive jurisdiction.

France argued that the islands should generate substantial maritime entitlements. Canada opposed a boundary that would allow the islands to project extensive jurisdiction into the surrounding Grand Banks region.

The tribunal created an unusual arrangement.

France received a defined maritime area around the islands, including a narrow southern corridor approximately 10.5 nautical miles wide, extending toward the 200-nautical-mile limit.

The arrangement is sometimes described as a keyhole because of its distinctive shape.

It did not award France the broad surrounding maritime territory it had sought.

It also did not award France a continental-shelf extension beyond the southern end of that corridor.

But there is a crucial qualification.

In paragraphs 77–82, the tribunal addressed its authority concerning continental-shelf rights beyond 200 nautical miles.

It determined that it could not decide that question under its mandate.

The award explained that declining to rule on the question should not be interpreted as prejudging, accepting or rejecting whatever extended-shelf rights France or Canada might possess.

The 1992 ruling settled the maritime boundary within the area the tribunal was authorized to delimit. It did not decide the competing entitlements to an extended continental shelf beyond 200 nautical miles.

That does not mean France subsequently acquired those rights.

It means the outer-shelf issue remained legally unresolved by that particular award.

There is a difference.

International Waters Are Not Necessarily an Unclaimed Seabed

Understanding the disagreement requires separating the water from the seabed beneath it.

Under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, different maritime zones create different legal rights.⁵ ⁶

Territorial sea: Generally extends up to 12 nautical miles from a country's baselines. The coastal state exercises sovereignty over the waters, seabed and airspace, subject to international rules including innocent passage.

Exclusive economic zone: May extend up to 200 nautical miles. The coastal state possesses sovereign rights over natural resources in the water column and seabed, including authority over fisheries.

Continental shelf: Concerns the seabed and subsoil. A coastal state possesses sovereign rights over the natural resources of its continental shelf, which can extend beyond 200 nautical miles where the requirements of the convention are satisfied.

High seas: Waters beyond national exclusive economic zones remain subject to the freedoms and obligations established by international law, including qualified freedom of fishing.

Here is the complication.

A vessel can be fishing in high-seas waters while operating above a seabed subject to a coastal state's continental-shelf rights.

The water and the seabed do not necessarily have identical legal status.

Article 78 expressly distinguishes the legal status of the waters above the continental shelf from the coastal state's rights in that shelf.⁶

Articles 87 and 116 protect high-seas fishing freedoms, subject to applicable international obligations.⁷

But Article 77 gives the coastal state exclusive rights to exploit resources legally belonging to its continental shelf.

Those rights do not depend on whether the state has physically occupied the seabed, developed its resources or publicly proclaimed ownership.

Beyond 200 nautical miles does not automatically mean beyond national resource rights.

The legal status depends on the area, the resource and the applicable entitlement.

That is particularly important when the proposed catch is snow crab.

The Snow-Crab Problem: A Moving Animal With Seabed Rights Attached

Snow crab lives and moves along the seabed.

That seems straightforward enough biologically.

Legally, however, it raises an unusual question.

Article 77(4) of the Law of the Sea Convention includes certain living organisms among the natural resources of the continental shelf.

These are known as sedentary species.

The definition covers organisms that, at the harvestable stage, either remain immobile on or beneath the seabed or cannot move without maintaining constant physical contact with it.⁶

An animal does not need to remain motionless throughout its life to qualify.

In February 2019, the Supreme Court of Norway considered this issue in litigation involving a vessel harvesting snow crab without Norwegian authorization.

The court concluded that snow crab qualified as a sedentary species under Article 77(4), bringing it within Norway's exclusive continental-shelf resource rights in that case.⁸

That judgment does not settle the France–Canada dispute and is not binding on either country's maritime boundary.

It does, however, provide persuasive legal authority for treating harvestable snow crab as a continental-shelf resource rather than automatically considering it a freely available high-seas catch.

Canadian legislation follows the same general definition.

Section 2.2 of Canada's Fisheries Act expressly extends the Act to sedentary species on portions of the Canadian continental shelf beyond Canadian fisheries waters.⁹

This is an important distinction.

Canada is not relying solely on a general political assertion that everything near the Grand Banks belongs to Canada.

It has a specific statutory provision applicable to sedentary resources on its continental shelf.

But the statute does not, by itself, determine the international boundary wherever another state asserts a competing entitlement.

The legal sequence matters.

First, establish where the harvesting would occur.

Second, establish the applicable continental-shelf entitlement.

Third, determine whether snow crab falls within the relevant resource rights.

Only then can the legal authority to permit or prohibit the harvesting be properly assessed.

A Historical Complication in France's Own Position

France's historical interpretation of sedentary species adds another dimension.

When France joined the 1958 Convention on the Continental Shelf, it formally declared an interpretation that generally excluded crustaceans from the convention's sedentary-species category, subject to a limited exception.¹⁰

That is not a trivial historical detail in a dispute now involving snow crab.

However, the 1958 declaration cannot simply be carried forward as France's controlling position under today's law.

Both Canada and France subsequently became parties to the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea.

Article 311 of the later convention provides that it prevails between its parties over the 1958 Geneva law-of-the-sea conventions.¹¹

France's older declaration therefore cannot be treated as a standing exemption from the current Article 77 regime.

Nor does it demonstrate that France has adopted the same interpretation in relation to the proposed 2026 operation.

It does establish that the classification of crustaceans has previously been a subject of legal disagreement.

A current French legal explanation identifying how its proposed snow-crab fishery fits the 1982 convention would help clarify the issue considerably.

2008: The Tail of the Grand Banks Was Already in the Plan

The proposed use of snow crab to expand Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon's fisheries economy did not begin in September 2026.

On December 10, 2008, French National Assembly members Annick Girardin and Louis Guédon presented a parliamentary report examining the maritime boundary between France and Canada.¹²

It discussed the economic difficulties facing the islands, the consequences of declining fisheries and the possibility of developing new resources.

Snow crab was explicitly identified as a potential opportunity.

The report discussed harvesting on the continental shelf, particularly around the Tail of the Grand Banks, and presented the exploitation of offshore snow-crab resources as a possible avenue for economic development.

It also included a map entitled Zones potentielles d'exploitation du crabe des neiges.

This is substantial evidence of an earlier development ambition.

The economic idea behind an expanded Saint-Pierre snow-crab fishery was already on the French parliamentary record in 2008.

But the map was a historical depiction of potential exploitation areas.

It was not an issued fishing licence.

It was not a negotiated maritime boundary.

And it cannot be assumed to represent the precise area contemplated by the 2026 exploratory proposal.

The report shows what French policymakers were interested in pursuing.

It does not show that Canada agreed to let them pursue it.

France's Government Was More Cautious Than Its Parliament

In June 2008, Annick Girardin questioned the French government about pursuing an extended continental shelf south of Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon.¹³

The government's response acknowledged serious legal and practical obstacles.

It noted the unusual geographical position created by the 1992 arbitration, the need for scientific work and the difficulties of conducting research in waters where Canadian authorization would be required.

It also recognized the limitations of the international continental-shelf process in resolving disputes between states.

This is worth remembering.

French parliamentarians were advocating an extension.

The French government was publicly acknowledging the obstacles.

Those positions were not identical.

And an ambition expressed in a parliamentary report was not the same thing as a legal determination that France possessed the claimed rights.

2009: Canada Drew Its Own Line

By March 2009, France had moved toward formally pursuing an extended continental shelf for Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon.

Canada responded publicly.

On March 25, 2009, Foreign Affairs Minister Lawrence Cannon issued a government statement opposing France's decision to reopen the continental-shelf question.¹⁴

Canada said the maritime delimitation had been definitively settled by the 1992 arbitration.

It also stated that Canada did not recognize any French continental-shelf claim in the northwest Atlantic beyond the area established by the award.

That was an unmistakable Canadian position.

There is a subtle but important distinction between the two governments' interpretations.

France emphasized that the tribunal had not ruled on the merits of extended-shelf entitlements.

Canada emphasized the final and binding character of the maritime delimitation awarded in 1992 and rejected additional French entitlements.

Both positions referred to the same arbitration.

They did not reach the same conclusion about the consequences of its unresolved outer-shelf question.

A public declaration by either government, however, is not itself a new international judgment.

2013–2014: The Disagreement Reached the United Nations

Canada submitted its Atlantic extended continental-shelf information to the United Nations Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf on December 6, 2013.¹⁵

France followed with a partial submission concerning Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon on April 16, 2014.¹⁶

The two submissions brought their respective claims into the United Nations continental-shelf process.

Canada objected to consideration of France's submission through a communication dated September 3, 2014.

France responded on December 17, 2014.

The official UN record identifies both communications and provides access to the accompanying submissions.¹⁶

France maintained that the 1992 arbitration had not disposed of its asserted extended-shelf entitlement.

Canada maintained its opposition to French claims beyond the area established by the 1992 award.

These were competing legal positions, not competing fishing licences.

The commission's role under Article 76 is to examine scientific and technical information about the outer limits of continental shelves and make recommendations. It is not a court empowered to settle a contested maritime boundary between Canada and France.

Article 83 deals separately with the delimitation of continental shelves between states with opposite or adjacent coasts.⁶

Even recommendations establishing outer limits would not, by themselves, determine a disputed boundary between the two countries.

Nor did the act of filing a submission create a new French exclusive economic zone or authorize a snow-crab fishery.

The 2014 submission was an assertion of continental-shelf entitlement, not proof of an internationally agreed entitlement and not an authorization to harvest crab.

2016: The Dispute Remained Before the United Nations

The Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf recorded a French presentation concerning Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon in August 2016.¹⁷

Its published session record acknowledged the dispute and the communications received concerning the submission.

The commission's procedures distinguish technical examination of outer-shelf limits from the resolution of overlapping maritime claims.

This matters because an unresolved dispute can prevent the ordinary consideration of a submission without automatically deciding the merits against either country.

Article 83(3) of the Law of the Sea Convention also contemplates provisional arrangements of a practical nature while states work toward delimitation.

Such arrangements can permit cooperation without prejudging the eventual boundary.

That creates a possible legal avenue for negotiated resource management.

But there is no basis for treating a provisional arrangement as an arrangement already made.

The existence of a procedure for cooperation is not evidence that cooperation has been agreed upon.

2019–2020: France Said a Bilateral Compromise Was Needed

The dispute did not disappear after the 2014 submission.

In July 2019, French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian addressed the question in the French Senate.¹⁸

He explained that the continental-shelf commission could not decide the dispute between France and Canada.

He said France needed to reach a bilateral compromise.

He also stated that France had proposed a dialogue between French and Canadian experts in 2016, but Canada had not agreed to begin those discussions at that time.

The French government's position remained clear in November 2020.

Responding to a parliamentary question, the Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs expressly acknowledged overlapping continental-shelf claims involving Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon and Newfoundland and Labrador.¹⁹

It stated that the commission could not settle the dispute and that France continued to favour a bilateral compromise.

The response also emphasized the development of Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon's economy, including fisheries cooperation, while the continental-shelf issue remained unresolved.

This is one of the most consequential findings in the historical record.

As recently as 2020, France's own Foreign Ministry publicly acknowledged that the extended continental-shelf disagreement with Canada remained unresolved.

That is very different from claiming the shelf had already been awarded to France.

The Existing French Crab Fishery Is a Different Legal Arrangement

France already regulates an established snow-crab fishery in waters under its sovereignty or jurisdiction around Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon.

The April 2026 management order sets a 262-tonne total allowable catch for NAFO subdivision 3Ps within those French-jurisdiction waters.²

It also establishes gear restrictions, minimum crab size, a prohibition on retaining females, catch reporting and monitoring requirements.

The order cites scientific advice from Ifremer dated April 13, 2026.

That illustrates what an actual fisheries management framework looks like.

There is a defined jurisdictional area, an annual catch limit, operational restrictions, monitoring procedures and regulatory enforcement.

Canada and France also have established bilateral fisheries arrangements, including an implementing agreement from December 1994 concerning reciprocal fisheries relations.²⁰

Those arrangements demonstrate that the countries have mechanisms for documenting fisheries cooperation.

They do not establish an unrestricted French right to harvest snow crab on the disputed outer shelf.

The 2026 proposal is different.

It concerns an additional exploratory operation reportedly intended for offshore grounds in NAFO area 3LNO, outside the established French fishing grounds.²³

The governing authority for that proposed operation has not been demonstrated through a published licence or new bilateral agreement.

An existing 262-tonne French fishery is not proof of a right to establish a separate 1,500-tonne fishery somewhere else.

Three Maps, Three Different Questions

There are at least three geographical records relevant to this controversy.

The first is the 1992 arbitration boundary, establishing the maritime division between Canada and France within the area decided by the tribunal.

The second is the 2014 French extended continental-shelf submission, depicting the seabed area for which France asserted outer-shelf entitlements.

The third would be the actual operational map of the proposed 2026 exploratory crab fishery.

The first two are documented.

The third has not been verified in the public records examined for this article.

Reporting identifies NAFO area 3LNO, including the Tail of the Grand Banks, as the general proposed location. That is useful geographical information, but NAFO management areas are not themselves determinations of maritime sovereignty or continental-shelf ownership.

The 2008 parliamentary report also contains a historical map of potential snow-crab exploitation areas, but it cannot substitute for a contemporary authorized fishing plan.

Until the proposed fishing grounds are identified precisely, several materially different legal situations remain possible.

The grounds could lie within an established jurisdictional zone.

They could fall within an area claimed by both Canada and France as continental shelf.

They could be located in an area Canada considers its extended continental shelf but where France proposes another legal justification for access.

Different locations may require different legal analyses.

It would be inaccurate to declare that every possible location beyond 200 nautical miles automatically belongs to Canada.

It would be equally inaccurate to treat such waters as automatically open to an unrestricted French snow-crab fishery.

The location is not a minor technical detail. It is essential to identifying the legal authority.

What Would Actually Authorize the Proposed Fishery?

There are several possible legal explanations that would require evidence.

France could assert an extended continental-shelf entitlement of its own.

In that case, it would have to address the geographical scope and legal strength of its claim, including Canada's competing position.

France could advance an argument based on high-seas fishing freedoms.

That would require confronting Article 77 and the distinction between ordinary high-seas living resources and sedentary organisms belonging to a coastal state's continental shelf.

France could seek Canadian consent for scientific research or exploratory harvesting in an area Canada considers to be its continental shelf.

That would require an appropriate legal arrangement and authorization.

The countries could also negotiate a provisional arrangement without resolving their ultimate boundary positions, as contemplated by UNCLOS Article 83.

But none of these possibilities should be confused with evidence that an agreement currently exists.

Nor would a French domestic licence alone conclusively settle whether harvesting in a contested area complied with international law.

What matters is whether the issuing state possesses the relevant legal authority, or whether an applicable agreement supplies it.

September–October 2026: Canada Rejects the Proposal

The federal government's position became clear following reports of Macron's pledge.

Fisheries Minister Joanne Thompson publicly expressed disappointment and urged France to abandon its proposed exploratory snow-crab fishery.

She also stated that Canada and France had established mechanisms for managing fisheries issues and that the matter had not been raised by French officials during the preceding Northwest Atlantic Fisheries Organization annual meeting.²⁴

On October 3, The Canadian Press reported Thompson's more explicit assertion that Canada claimed the extension of its continental shelf, including snow crab in the area of the proposed operation.²⁴

This is an important part of Canada's legal position.

Canada is asserting rights over the continental-shelf resource itself, not merely claiming that the waters above it fall within the ordinary Canadian exclusive economic zone.

That position is consistent with Canada's interpretation of its continental-shelf entitlements and the sedentary-species provisions of international law.

However, it remains Canada's asserted position in a dispute involving France's competing historical claim.

The minister's statement does not, by itself, constitute a final international delimitation of the contested shelf.

Newfoundland and Labrador Premier Tony Wakeham also rejected France's proposed action, arguing that it fell outside French authority.²⁵

The province's position reflects the direct economic interest of Newfoundland and Labrador's harvesting communities in any proposed new exploitation of Grand Banks crab resources.

October 6, 2026: Ottawa Says No Licence Exists

On October 6, Newfoundland and Labrador Senator Fabian Manning raised the proposed fishery in the Senate of Canada.¹

He described the reported five-year proposal and its potential effects on Canadian crab harvesters.

Government Representative Pierre Moreau responded that no talks concerning the reported change had taken place and that no such fishing permit had been issued by French authorities.

He also confirmed that Canadian officials had been in contact with French officials.

That response distinguished diplomatic communication from negotiation of a fishing agreement.

The government had contacted France.

But no completed fisheries arrangement or issued licence was being reported.

October 13, 2026: France Says It Will Consult Canada

On October 13, French Ambassador to Canada Hélène Farnaud-Defromont confirmed that France had not issued the reported fishing licence.²¹

She said France would not issue such a licence without consulting Canada and emphasized that France intended to respect its existing agreements.

Canada's Fisheries Minister Joanne Thompson subsequently described the matter as “not an active story.”²²

According to Thompson, the French ambassador had indicated that the proposed fishery was not part of ongoing discussions between Canada and France.

Those statements are reassuring to harvesters concerned about an imminent unilateral operation.

But they do not establish that the original proposal was formally cancelled.

They do not provide the missing fishing coordinates.

They do not resolve the continental-shelf dispute.

And they do not constitute a completed agreement granting France access to the proposed harvesting area.

As of October 28, 2026, the public records examined for this article have not established that the proposed exploratory fishery has received a licence, a completed Canada–France authorization, or publicly verified operational fishing coordinates.

The documented status remains narrower than the original political announcement.

A licence was promised or proposed, but the available evidence does not establish an authorized outer-shelf crab fishery.

What Newfoundland and Labrador Stand to Lose — or Have to Negotiate

For Newfoundland and Labrador, this is not merely a question of whether Paris and Ottawa can agree on a line across an ocean chart.

It concerns an economically important species supporting harvesting enterprises, crews, processing operations and coastal communities.

The proposed 1,500-tonne annual harvest cannot responsibly be assessed without determining which crab population would be affected.

That requires scientific evidence.

Are the proposed fishing grounds connected biologically to existing Canadian-managed crab resources?

Would the activity exploit an independently assessed population?

What removals are already taking place?

What scientific evidence supports the proposed annual quantity?

And if access is negotiated, how will the catches be counted and enforced?

There are also economic questions that neither government should ignore.

Would the fishery employ vessels based in Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon?

Would catches be landed and processed there?

Would Canadian vessels or processors participate?

What effects, if any, would be experienced by Newfoundland and Labrador enterprises?

Would the economic arrangement resemble existing reciprocal fisheries cooperation, or introduce an entirely different operating structure?

These are not reasons to dismiss the economic needs of Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon.

The French islands have faced severe fisheries-related challenges of their own, and the historical record demonstrates a longstanding effort to diversify their maritime economy.

But economic hardship does not independently create jurisdiction over a disputed resource.

Nor should regional cooperation mean that communities potentially affected by a new arrangement are left to discover its terms after the political announcement.

Conservation, licensing, enforcement, landing, processing and local benefits would all require scrutiny.

The Continental Shelf Cannot Be Negotiated Away by a Headline

The record now establishes a clear sequence.

In 1992, an arbitration tribunal settled a defined maritime boundary but declined to rule on extended-shelf entitlements beyond 200 nautical miles.

In 2008, French parliamentarians were already promoting the snow-crab potential near the Tail of the Grand Banks.

In 2009, Canada publicly rejected any additional French continental-shelf claim in the region.

In 2014, France formally submitted its extended-shelf claim to the United Nations, and Canada objected.

In 2019 and 2020, the French government explained that a bilateral compromise would be necessary to resolve the disagreement.

In September 2026, the reported exploratory snow-crab proposal for ASPM Océan brought the unresolved issue back into public view.

Canada opposed it, asserting its continental-shelf rights over the snow crab in the proposed area.

And in October, both governments confirmed that the proposed licence had not been issued.

What remains missing is the evidence that would connect an announced fishing plan to a legally supportable harvesting operation.

The public needs the proposed coordinates.

It needs the scientific justification.

It needs the legal authority being claimed.

And if a negotiated arrangement is contemplated, it needs to know what Canada and France would actually agree to.

The answer might involve a Canadian continental-shelf entitlement, a contested French entitlement, a properly documented bilateral arrangement, or another legal position requiring careful examination.

But it cannot be established simply by calling the location international waters.

Nor can a unilateral political promise resolve competing claims left unsettled for decades.

For Newfoundland and Labrador's fishing communities, the question is straightforward.

Who has the right to authorize the harvesting of snow crab on the proposed grounds, and under what conditions?

Until that question is answered with an identified location and an applicable legal instrument, the proposed fishery remains just that: a proposal.

The shelf dispute is real. The existing boundaries are real. The Canadian and French legal positions are documented. But a contested continental-shelf claim is not, by itself, a fishing licence.

Related Bayman's Paradox Reading

Saint-Pierre's Fishing Future — and Newfoundland's Crab

https://baymansparadox.com/post/saint-pierres-fishing-future-and-newfoundlands-crab

The Interpêche File: Public Money, Canadian Capital, and a Failed Fisheries Revival

https://baymansparadox.com/post/the-interpeche-file-public-money-canadian-capital-and-a-failed-fisheries-revival

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