The elimination of a five-person contaminant toxicology team in St. Andrews has some people worried about the future of long-term environmental monitoring in the province.

A group of concerned citizens called Save Our Ocean Sciences Committee held a forum Wednesday night in St. Andrews to discuss the impact of the Department of Fisheries and Oceans cuts.

Dr. Karen Kidd, an eco-toxicologist at the University of New Brunswick in Saint John, said university research can't replace the work government scientists do. She spent six years working in federal science.

"There was a big lobster kill a few years ago in the Bay of Fundy and DFO dropped what they were doing and went out to investigate why were these lobster dying. And that's something that we really can't do at universities because we're committed to teaching, it takes us time to find students to do this work and there's often delays bringing in funding as well," Kidd said.

"So we just can't be the environmental firefighters that DFO scientists or other federal scientists can be."

New Brunswick scientists monitor fish stocks and work with local industries to make sure fish farming is done in a way that doesn't harm the environment, said Kidd.

She said about 16 jobs are being lost at various facilities across New Brunswick and Nova Scotia.

"We certainly know that there's going to be environmental issues out there for us and who's going to respond to them after these cuts go through is really a huge question and a huge concern of mine," she said.