Expanding fish farms a risky business

June 11, 2004

As anyone familiar with the controversy swirling around fish farming knows, the biggest concentration of fish farms in British Columbia is in the Broughton Archipelago. And the ocean waters around that island group northeast of Campbell River have proven lethal to legions of young, wild pink salmon in recent years.

That wild fish should be dying in droves near aquatic feedlots is no surprise. The deaths of thousands of chickens and the forced slaughter of millions more to control the recent avian influenza outbreak in the Fraser Valley show that bad things happen when large numbers of living things are tightly packed together.

On today's fish farms, a million or more salmon may be enclosed in a series of ocean net cages. The pens act like magnets for pests and diseases. What's more, because the fish are "kept safe" from predators, there is no natural culling of diseased fish. So problems amplify in the pens -- and before long, spill into surrounding waters.

The horrific images of small wild pink salmon, pulled from waters adjacent to fish farms and covered in sea lice and bloody lesions, is a recurring public relations nightmare for the industry. And it may be one reason why some of the biggest salmon farming companies in the province have quietly received provincial government approval to switch production from salmon to halibut or sablefish.

Switching species would be a neat way for the industry to distance itself from charges that it is endangering wild salmon and coastal ecosystems that British Columbians care deeply about. But you can bet there's more to it than that, not the least being that farming salmon is a risky business. So successful have companies become at growing Atlantic salmon in Pacific waters that the prices paid for farmed salmon have plummeted to one quarter of their level 20 years ago.

With all kinds of capital sunk in salmon farms, the only way to make money is to intensify production. That means more fish per farm, which, ironically enough, increases the risk of devastating disease outbreaks that have wiped out entire crops of salmon. For these reasons, 46 salmon farms in B.C. are considering switching production to sablefish (also called black cod) or halibut.

Significantly, the halibut and sablefish fisheries are among the most well-managed in the province. Prices paid for both species are generally high, allowing those in the industry to enjoy reasonable livelihoods -- something that cannot be said for a lot of others.

Today, just to get into a modest sablefish operation would require an investment of somewhere around $5 million. With costs like that, it's no surprise that participants work hard to ensure that stocks remain healthy.

In recent years, West Coast sablefish fishermen have spent upwards of $2 million annually to assess the health of sablefish stocks. They have also designed special traps that allow the younger and smaller fish to escape unharmed. And in some years they, not government regulators, lobbied successfully for boats to be kept out of the water to ensure that stocks are rebuilt.

On the halibut side, consider this. In Victoria alone, there are 30 fish and chips shops in the Yellow Pages. The premium product they sell -- one that has people lining up on sunny days all over the provincial capital -- is halibut. That's West Coast wild halibut, with its unmistakably firm white flesh and mild sweet taste.

Fish retailers and restaurateurs in droves have lamented the comparatively bland taste and mushy texture of farmed salmon. Many, respecting their customers' wishes, have made it a public policy that they will not serve farmed fish. Victoria's mom-and-pop fish-and-chip shops will likely be next if a whole bunch of farmed halibut makes its way to market.

As the legion of poorly paid salmon fishermen in the province attest, the spectacular rise in farmed salmon production devastated the commercial fishing sector. Now, the salmon farming industry is setting its sights on competing with two of the better managed and economically viable fisheries in the province.

What's more, they're doing so with the provincial government's blessing and without having shown that these operations will not devastate local wild sablefish and halibut stocks as they have done with salmon.

Perhaps the most troubling aspect of the story is that to grow just one pound of farmed sablefish or halibut requires catching as much as five pounds of fish elsewhere in the ocean and converting it to feed. In a province that boasts of its commitment to sustainable development, promoting sablefish and halibut farming is nothing short of lunacy.

And if our present experience with salmon farming is any indication, we won't have long to wait before seeing damaged ocean ecosystems and more out-of-work fishers and retailers.

Eric Wickham is Executive Director of the Canadian Sablefish Association

© Times Colonist (Victoria) 2004