Halt the eco-annihilation by open fish farms in BC

Food security is important for any nation and until very recently residents of BC, Canada's most westernly Province, could find security in an abundant wild salmon population that was the delight of residents and visitors, one which employed a large fishing industry. The Cod fishery on Canada's East Coast had been destroyed decades ago but residents of BC believed that the Cod experience meant their politicians would protect this precious resource of wild salmon. From a national standpoint, the fish component of Canada's food security has looked to the West Coast's wild salmon fishery when asked where our domestic fish supply might come from in times of need. However, reckless expansion of fish farming over the past few years and their polluting sea lice from open pen farming operations now threatens to drive the wild salmon species to extinction and take the entire BC ecosystem with it. Sea lice are able survive the winter in the protection of mainly Norwegian-owned fish farms located at the very estuaries where vulnerable juvenile salmon travel to the ocean from spawning grounds. These sea lice escape, killing 95% of juvenile salmon (Source: CBC Dec 13/07). While the politicians debate the role of fish farming in BC, neighboring Alaska has an abundant salmon population and has no fish farming in the US's EEZ off their coast. BC residents are questioning the motivation of the government allowing the further operation and planned expansion of foreign owned fish farms. (A Norwegian triad of companies%u2014Cermaq, Marine Harvest, and Greig Seafoods %u2014controls about 90 percent of B.C. salmon-farm licences. Source: Straight.com) These foreign corporations have no obligation to provide food security to BC or Canada, and are not required to undo any damage done to our ecosystem. Brian Gunn, president of the Campbell River%u2013based Wilderness Tourism Association commented to Straight.com on Mar 6/08, speaking on Norwegian fish farming operations %u201CNorway, Scotland, and Ireland...have ruined their wild fisheries,%u201D Gunn says. %u201CIt%u2019s also hard not to think of the East Coast cod.%u201D The West Coast of Vancouver Island once boasted 1,200 stocks. Now, some 718 -- more than half -- are extinct, at moderate risk of extinction or considered stocks of special concern. Province-wide, at least 142 salmon populations have vanished forever. (Source: Suzuki Foundation). Moreover, tourism that relies on fish generates $700 million per year and employs thousands. The bigger picture is that the ecosystem that relies on wild salmon includes bald eagles, seals, whales and bears, so the entire BC tourism industry of $1.6 billion is at risk of being destroyed by three Norweigna firms left to run amok. Fisheries ecologist Martin Krkosek of the University of Alberta reported that sea lice have killed more than 80 percent of the annual pink salmon returns. We are even angering our US neighbors with our reckless environmental damage, as the press in Alaska and Washington state is increasingly alarmed at the impact of our farming on their natural stocks.

It is time for the government of Canada and BC to recognize how these corporations transfer costs to our ecosystems so they can generate profits. The entire social and environmental cost must be considered. Perhaps the government has just become too cozy with these corporations. The government is, amazingly, flying in the face of scientific research (the same scientific research if it were about climate change would trigger all kinds of controls) and considering approving expansion of these controverisal fish farms, as reported in the Globe and Mail and other media in November 2008. The wild salmon industry and its oceans is the sovereign property of the people of Canada, within the territorial limit of 370km, and is not some item for sale to Norwegian corporations so they can use it as a dumping ground, turning our precious resource into a dead zone so they can enjoy short term profits (scientists now believe the Cod fishery off Atlantic Canada, destroyed over 20 years ago, may never recover due to the irreparable harm done .

Whats more. the natives of Canada rely on salmon for cultural reasons, so this is a direct threat to their heritage. If our elected officials will so easily turn a blind eye to this likely permanent damage , then the people must take action, for it will be the people and not the foreign corproations or our current elected officials, who will bear the liability of a dead ecosystem. We require an immediate halt to any further expansion of fish farms and all operating fish farms must close and reopen far away from estuaries. To continue operations farms must implement technology such as closed net systems to stop the pollution, including sea lice, that this fish farming generates. The pollution of the ocean by these farms and the damage to what was until a few years ago an abundant natural wild salmon population must stop, for it is the result of these corporations transferring costs to society so they can enjoy profits which are then taken out of Canada mainly to Norway. We Canadians are then left with the problem of an impaired ecosystem. The whales and bears and bald eagles will face extinction next if this destructive abuse of nature is not halted. Then the BC jobs in fishing and tourism will be at risk. These fish farms and our government must no longer be permitted to act with impunity.