A First Nation in British Columbia lost its bid to gain widespread access to commercial fishing rights in a Supreme Court decision Thursday.

The aboriginal band, called Lax Kw'alaams, was seeking a declaration that it is entitled to a native right to harvest and sell all species of fish – including seaweed, shellfish and fish – in its traditional territory in the Prince Rupert region of the province.

The band currently has the right to fish for food, social and ceremonial purposes, but not to sell. The claim was denied in lower courts and the Supreme Court upheld those decisions, and their reasons, in its unanimous decision Thursday.

If the Lax Kw'alaams had been able to establish that trade was integral to their culture and sustenance prior to contact with the Europeans in the 1790s, the Consitution would have protected their aboriginal rights and they could have been granted access to sell products on a commercial scale.

The Supreme Court found that they were not primarily a trading people pre-contact and therefore their ancient customs and practices do not translate into a constitutionally-protected right to harvest and sell all kinds of fish in a modern commercial fishery.

A lower court previously found that while the band's predecessors, the Coast Tsimshian, did fish a variety of species including salmon and halibut, they only traded in a specific grease product called euchalon, derived from one species.

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