From: Postmottak FKD
Date: September 21, 2009 6:16:06 AM PDT (CA)
Sir/madam
Thank you for your e-mail to Minister Helga Pedersen, who has asked me
to answer on her behalf.
We acknowledge your concern for the environment and the declining stocks
of wild salmon, and we believe that most Canadian fish-farmers share
your concern. All companies operating fish farms in Canada, including
Norwegian owned companies, are oblige to follow rules and regulations
at the place of operation, in this case Canadian federal and provincial
regulations and standards. The Norwegian government is confident that
the Canadian federal government, and the provincial government in
British Colombia, is regulating and controlling the fish-farming
industry in the best possible way to mitigate the environmental risk
from fish-farming, taking Canadian national and provincial
considerations into account.
Regards
Yngve Torgersen
Deputy Director General
Dear Yngve Torgersen:
Thank you for your effort to address our concerns, but I don’t think you have been accurately informed on the situation here in British Columbia. Nine million sockeye salmon vanished without a trace and the Minister of Fisheries, Gail Shea has told us your fish farms are not responsible because there was a coastwide collapse of all salmon. Fortunately this is not true. While there have been some very alarming collapses this year, this is not the case among the southcoast sockeye. Only the ones going past Norwegians fish farms vanished, the others made strong returns.
Similarly, the Pacific Region director of Fisheries, Paul Sprout, wrote letters in newspapers claiming that the lice on the juvenile sockeye that vanished were not the species found on farm salmon. This is not true either. On Marine Harvest’s own website over 92% of the farms reported the exact same species in the year and months that the missing sockeye swam past them.
The only thing being controlled is the public perception. The fish farm industry is increasingly associated with the spread of the ISA virus. But our Minister of Fisheries claims, against the science coming from Norway, that the virus is not carried in the eggs.
What do you say to this? How do you respond to the Canadian government protecting your industry with statements that are not accurate?
Can you be sure diseases on your fish farms are not responsible for loss of one of Canada’s most valuable fish resources? If so why?
Sincerely,
Alexandra Morton, biologist
Comments
8 responses to “Reply from Norway”
The response from Norway is 100% correct! What is happening here is a conscious, premeditated and intentional attack on the Public Resources that belong to the people of BC. The elected and unelected officails are saying “Ok guys, it is yours to destroy and send the profits back to Norway”
The Public Resources of BC can not LEGALLY be taken away without the consent of the Provincial and Federal authorities! It is time for someone to get angry, stand up and say ENOUGH IS ENOUGH. We value what is ours even if you don’t!
Dear Ms. Morton,
In the last 2 years the Berings Sea has been raped by the likes of McD’s, Burger King and Dairy Queen et.al for their fish burgers and also by many others for Surimi/”crab” sticks and for frozen “white fish” dishes. The target as I am sure you know is the Alaskan Pollock.
However, in each of the last three years, the pollock population/catch has declined greatly; in 2008, it fell 38 percent and scientists now believe that the 2009 pollock catch will be the lowest in 30 years.
If the Bering Sea is being trashed to such a massive and total extent, are you sure your Fraser Salmon have not just perhaps been caught up in this commercial fishing mega-war that has been raging just off your coast for the last few years ???
Another thought:
Seal numbers have been declining as Killer whales eat them (rather than other whales). What if killer whales have also taken a liking to your salmon ?! It seems they (the salmon)are numerous enough and big enough to make it well worth a killer whales time and effort ??
Maybe the seals themselves have changed their diet because this fishing war has depleted other more traditional food sources for them and they now prize Fraser Salmon as highly as we/you do ??!!
Another thought, what if a local cold or hot water sea current has shifted slightly (due to GW or something else) and means that your salmon found your river slightly too cold/hot/different to return to it as usual and instead found somewhere else to try.
Unlikely perhaps, but in nature you never know.
I agree these fish farms should be very closely watched and also part of any investigation into why your salmon aren’t here as expected, but some of your vitriol I have seen around the web does appear to be from “someone on a mission” and not fully open to other natural/random/unknown factors that may simply mean the salmon upped and went somewhere else this time or were killed by another force in between leaving a few years ago and not coming back today.
Full Disclosure: I have no relationship with the FF’s or the Salmon, I just want to make sure the people involved in this look at ALL of the salmon non-return possibilities and are not just quickly pointing the finger of blame at they who are most visible and therefore the easiest to blame.
Sutski 123
All of your suggestions are plausible. But where is there evidence and testeable hypotheses?
There may well be many risk factors at work and one or more risks may be the tipping point for particular fish stock extinction. But when the regulators assert that “fish farms” are not responsible, declines to provide any evidence and relies on expert advice proferred in secret, then a reasonable observer is entitled to question just why conclusions are drawn in a non-transparent fashion. Some of these conclusions may have enormous ecological consequences and need independent scrutiny.
If we are to get to the bottom of this mystery, we, the taxpayers and concerned citizens, need independent scientific experts not expert advocates. As long as the fisheries regulators’ scientific expertise is presented in an advocacy manner, then there will always be some doubt as to how the conclusions are/were drawn.
Science should not be tool for advocacy but a tool for knowledge.
Sutski123: let me give you an exact copy of what is happening in BC! 34 years ago the salmon farms moved into the Quoddy/ Grand Manan area of the Bay of Fundy which separates NS & NB. Prior to the farms the 32 rivers of the Inner Bay hosted a wild salmon run 60,000 strong. Not much when compared to BC’s resources but important to us. There were NO KILLER WHALES, huge seal populations or Rape & Pillaging going on in the bay. The Inner Bay salmon are unique in that they mature in 2 years in the home rivers, then return as grilse after one year in salt water. They have ONE feeding area while at sea the QUODDY/ GRAND MAMAN waters! Within 5 years of the farms going into operation the wild fish started to disappear. In 1996 ISA was brought into the bay by eggs imported from NORWAY (which BC is doing now) Sea lice numbers expanded beyond control and ISA raced through the entire industry. Meanwhile our healthy wild fish swam around OUTSIDE the pens. ISA which was NEVER RECORDED in wild fish started to show up in rivers close to the farms. European studies tell us once a farm goes in we loose 50% of our wild run each year. There are now less than 200 fish spawning in our rivers. DFO says it is a mystery what happens to large numbers of healthy smolts when they leave our rivers & begin the salt warter phase of their life cycle!!!!
REALLY? BC IS SHOWING YOU RIGHT NOW,OPEN YOUR EYES!!!
Helmsdale. Agreed. Private and non-transparent hearings are things of Dictatorships, not of OUR democratic countries…you would hope. Scandalous that the Chief was not allowed in to add to the debate. Evidence for my thoughts. None. I am only pointing out there may be other reasons for the decline.
Nomlas. “They have ONE feeding area while at sea the QUODDY/ GRAND MAMAN waters!” Do you know that massive 25km long gill nets are still allowed to be employed within 200 miles of coastlines…I would wager a single one could decimate a run of 60,000 fish ??!! Also, if you know where they feed, you can bet others do/did know as well, including other non-human carnivores!!
You may be correct about ISA coming in in eggs, I do not know the technicalities of the virus. Again, something for they who are investigating to follow up on and make sure is not the case.
ISA has wiped out Chilean salmon this year, MH is also down there?
And by the way, my eyes are open, thats why I am here asking questions. I am just trying to make sure YOUR and others eyes are open to other factors about which you/investigators may not be aware of 🙂
Sutski123 SORRY 🙁 it was not your eyes I wanted to open but those of DFO who claim to know the science! As for the 25 K gill nets, not applicable in the Bay of Fundy!! Toatlly Canadian waters and only 60 KM in total width. Carnivores yes we have them and the salmon farms are taking care of those who venture too near the irrestable buffet swimming inside the open net pens! As for ISA in Chile!! Yes, the disease arrived there from NORWAY, in 1996 lay dormant in Chilean waters for 10 years and when they tried to contain the sea lice on the fish it brought out a whole new more deadly strain!! For your own info Google “ISA in Chile arrived from Norway 1996” The study was done by a prominant peerreviewed CANADIAN virolagist at UPEI.
THE SCIENCE IS IN!! THE POLITICS & BUTT COVERING ARE OUT TO LUNCH
Sutski123 – It would be exceptional if whales, fishermen and other ocean impacts singled out the sockeye that migrate north out of the Fraser River and did not touch the Harrison sockeye, the Columbia River sockeye nor the Somass River sockeye.
The”vitriol” as you call it comes not from reading papers and talking to people, it comes from personally following, observing and measuring the impact of fish farms. I have lived among the farms for 22 years as a resident and biologist. This means I am equipped to record the increases in algae blooms, bacteria, and parasites. I have done hundreds of plankton tows and searched the sea floor for their waste mountains. I have been an observer on shrimp boats and measured the disease rate in flat fish around fish farms. I have seen my town whither and die as the farms got bigger and more numerous around us, debunking the theory that fish farms are good for small coastal communities. I have corresponded with scientists around the world and compared notes with them and found the common ground is fish farms kill wild fish.
I have lived with and studied this industry up-close for decades and remain incredulous that people want to protect this Norwegian industry even as it destroys coastal ecosystems and livelihoods of small businesses and fishermen around the world. What makes people do this? Why grasp at straws when there is hard evidence recreating itself EVERYWHERE this industry goes?
The evidence is so clear and we are drifting over the line of no return as we refuse to see it. I love my home waters and that is why I cannot step away from this. This is not a job. Thanks to all for your comments.
Alexandra Morton has pointed out a key point of evidence.
When various fish stocks have similar fresh water development conditions, have similar conditions for entry into salt water, are likely to have similar predation conditions in the Pacific Ocean yet the fish stocks that migrate past the fish farms suffer an unexpected and catastrophic loss. The other stocks, with presumably similar ocean predation conditions meet or exceed forecast return levels but do not swim past fish farms, then a reasonable person, looking at this fact pattern, might assume that there is a high liklihood that some factor associated with the migratory pattern past the fish farms is a contributing factor in the decline. Or else the fish return forecasters are using different models for political rather than ecological reasons.
It is in the nature of scientific inquiry that experts might differ. It is also in the nature of scientific inquiry that conclusions be evidence based, not based on advocacy, yet our DFO regulators seem admanant that fish farms are not responsible for the Fraser River sockeye collapse. Yet, as far as I can tell, the DFO declines to provide the evidence for drawing this conclusion and cannot point to any other indirect evidence that supports this conclusion.
Most of use vitally concerned with this issue are not marine biologists and depend on experts to assiduously address evidence “in the public interest”. We need independent experts not industry advocates to address the evidence.
So far, in my view, the DFO has failed to act in the public interest and continuously seems to support specific sectors to the detriment of broader economic and ecological issues.
This is an ecological tragedy that is unfolding before our eyes.