St. Mary’s Bay fish farm application filed
Community vows to show its opposition
Canadian Salmon Farms Ltd. has taken the next step in the application process to develop four fin fish aquaculture sites in St. Mary’s Bay, and the community says it will be taking the next steps necessary to show its opposition.
The applications are currently under review by the provincial Department of Fisheries and Aquaculture, as well as other relevant provincial and federal departments and agencies, says Department spokesperson Bruce Nunn.
“A copy of the applications and supporting documentation will be posted to the Department’s website after initial screening,” he says.
Following the review phase, which does not have a regulated timeline, the completed applications will be referred to the Nova Scotia Aquaculture Review Board (NSARB), says Nunn. “This part of the application process is called the Review Phase and the NSARB is not involved in the Review Phase,” he says.
Applications will be submitted to the NSARB once the review of the applications are complete and First Nation consultations are concluded, he adds.
“The NSARB provides an opportunity for members of the public to participate in the public hearing process,” Nunn says. “Notification of the date of the public hearing will be made through the department’s website.”
Once an application for a new marine site is referred to the NSARB, within 15 days the NSARB will set a date(s) for a public hearing, with a minimum of 60 days public notice required in advance of the hearing. The NSARB will issue a decision on the applications and the decision will be posted on the department’s website.
When word spread early last month that Canadian Salmon Ltd. has been exploring the viability of a proposed phased aquaculture project with development sites near Digby Neck and islands under an option to lease agreement with Nova Scotia Fisheries and Aquaculture, it didn’t take long for the community to react.
“We have been fighting the salmon cage spread in this district for decades,” says David Tudor, municipal councillor for the Digby Neck area in an open letter to residents of the Digby Neck Area.
“We have turned out in the hundreds to oppose the salmon pen feedlots under the rallying cry that we will not let them do to the Saint Mary’s what they did to Grande Passage. How many times do we have to say no?” he wrote. “Do we really have to engage in a community-wide battle every five years decade after decade while the Halifax suits cheer these overseas companies on?”
A public meeting on Feb. 16 at the Digby Neck Volunteer Fire Department followed the two virtual public information sessions held by the company on Feb. 8 and 9.
The meeting was organized by the St. Mary’s Bay Protectors, a group of community organizations, citizens, fishers and business owners concerned about the economic prosperity, social well-being and environmental sustainability of the coastal resources.
The local fishing community is opposed to the development, says Gwen Wilson, who is part of steering committee of the group.
“One of the greatest threats to the area is the displacement of lobster fishers from their fishing grounds,” Wilson says. “Our concern is why would you put that industry at risk?”
While there’s always the promise of new jobs with any aquaculture development, the number of jobs that would be put at risk because of the displacement of the fishing grounds, which in turn displaces lobster fishers is poses, “a greater threat of losing more jobs than what would be acquired,” says Wilson.
St. Mary’s Bay is a nursery for lobster stocks, she says. “We don’t to put anything in those waters that’s going to pose a risk to those young lobsters.”
Wilson says the local community is familiar “with the results you can have in the Bay with the experience with Kelly Cove and they are very experienced with the kind of fight these big companies can put up,” she says, citing the opposition to a proposed development by Cermaq in 2020.
“The difference between Cermaq and this one is we had knowledge of the option to lease and had time before they submitted their application to dissuade them. With Canadian Salmon Farms they purposely operated under the radar, and while they may have communicated with a select few of whom they considered to be stakeholders, they certainly were not communicating with the public,” she says. “We didn’t know what they were doing until close to the end of their option period.”
Wilson says St. Mary’s Bay Protectors will be putting pressure on local politicians with letter writing campaigns and will continue to have public meetings as need be.
In a previous interview with
Saltwire Network, Canadian Salmon Ltd. said for the past year it has been exploring the viability of a proposed phased aquaculture project with development sites near Digby Neck and islands under an option to lease agreement with Nova Scotia Fisheries and Aquaculture.
“We started collecting the data – what we knew we needed to make a professional decision of whether this particular area would be suitable for what we wanted to do,” said Martin Karlsen, project principal and industry veteran. He said the data was as expected – the area would be quite suitable. The company said it was looking at growing Atlantic salmon and rainbow trout.
“We’re planning to start with one site and go into four sites,” he said at that time. “Most likely no more than three sites will be stocked at any one time,” he said during a mid-February interview, saying each site would have 12 cages.