Marine Harvest CEO debates farming future with BC critic
BRITISH Columbia’s salmon farmers continue to come under pressure from environmental groups and First Nation protesters, some of whom have occupied farms. Although the value of salmon farming to BC rose 37 per cent between 2013 and 2016, and the industry supports 2,966 direct jobs and 2,716 indirect jobs, the sector remains in an uncomfortable spotlight, according to the Vancouver Sun.
The newspaper invited Marine Harvest CEO Alf-Helge Aarskog and Canadian environmental activist David Suzuki to debate the issues. Below is an edited account.
Why is it so hard to find a consensus on the risk salmon farms pose to wild salmon?
Aarskog: The decline or increase in salmon stocks is very hard to predict, because you have to take into account what happens in the ocean, access to food, overfishing by other countries. We have to consider the effect of global warming and why some (spawning) rivers are doing better than others. It’s hard to know the impact of farms, but we haven’t found a wild salmon with a disease that came from farmed salmon, yet.
Suzuki: We see the world through the psychological lenses of our values and beliefs. If you are an indigenous person, you see the world in a radically different way from someone who is a business person. The other problem is we haven’t done the science. How the hell are we going to have any consensus when we are so ignorant?
How can we reconcile the different conclusions in studies of sea lice by scientists backed by industry, government and environmental groups?
Aarskog: What we can do is continue to manage sea lice and we already have extremely small numbers of sea lice when the small fish migrate into the ocean. Sea lice are natural, but what we have to do is make sure the numbers of sea lice are as low as they can be and we do that with success. We are open and transparent about our numbers; they are published regularly.
Suzuki: It’s very clear that DFO (Fisheries and Oceans Canada) is acting like a cheerleader for the salmon farming industry and they have totally ignored their responsibility to protect the wild salmon.
How seriously should we regard warnings about transfer of viruses between farmed salmon and wild salmon?
Aarskog: There are parallels we can see from our experience in Norway. We have never seen any disease transferred from Atlantic farmed salmon to wild salmon and not the other way around either.
Suzuki: If you believe in the precautionary principle, we should take that risk very, very seriously.
The advisory council [set up by minister Lana Popham] suggested moving fish farms from sensitive locations to waters further removed from migratory routes of wild salmon. Is this a way forward for salmon aquaculture in BC?
Aarskog: It’s worthwhile to consider locations for farms. There is a moratorium on new farms right now, but if that was lifted we could look at places that are farther from migratory routes. Relocation is possible and we are willing to look at that.
Suzuki: That is how the fish farms have justified themselves in the first place. They say, don’t worry about what’s coming out of there, we will just move them where they can’t do any harm.
After a large Atlantic salmon escape, Washington state has banned ocean based Atlantic salmon farming. Have their lawmakers made an evidence based decision?
Aarskog: There were mistakes made by the fish farm there and that shouldn’t have happened. Escapes like that are not good for anybody and least of all the salmon farmer. We can only concern ourselves with our practices and our record on escapes in the past five years has been tremendously good.
Suzuki: Absolutely, they have. Why would we allow an alien species when we already have five species of salmon here?
Are we any closer to moving this industry on to land?
Aarskog: A lot of money is being put into land based salmon farming these days. There is one in Miami and a few others in Europe and so far no one has succeeded because the costs are so high. The oldest one is in Denmark and it has been bankrupt three times. Instead, we are looking at technologies for closed systems in the ocean.
Suzuki: The one land based Atlantic salmon farm in BC is a desperate attempt by the Kwakwaka’wakw people to say ‘you’ve wiped out our salmon runs and we are terrified by what is happening in the Broughton’. They at least want to try to show that it could be done on land.
What does the future hold? Aarskog: About 70 per cent of the planet is covered by water and two per cent of what we eat comes from the ocean. It is just more efficient to produce fish in the ocean and it’s far less carbon intensive than any protein produced on land. We need to move more food production into the ocean and really take advantage of that system. If you think about it, fishing is the equivalent of hunting for all of the meat we need. Obviously that isn’t going to work, so we need to take more control of the oceans, not less.
Suzuki: These aren’t fish that are going to feed the world’s hungry. Atlantic salmon is a high-end product. And they are carnivores … in order to grow them you have to feed them fish and if you do get them to eat plant based feed they don’t taste like anything. What is the point of that?