Ahousaht First Nation Stands Up to Foreign Multinational Cermaq, and Stephen Harper, Chilean Residents Take on Cermaq and Win, Nova Scotians Boycott Farmed Fish In Stores, Updated Sep 14, 2015

Well, finally, someone has said no to more fish farms in Clayoquot Sound, BC. The Ahousaht First Nation has blockaded the site - the 22nd  fish farm in a non-flushing Sound. If you have been to Ahousaht, it is clear that it needs major support from our BC and federal government, not fish farms that destroy their food resources.

Clayoquot Sound has only 501 wild chinook left in six rivers. There should be no fish farms here. During Cohen Commission hearings, Dr. Kristi Miller said 25% of farmed fish, in this case chinook, had diseases. Some 125,000 per farm. With 65 billion viruses being released per hour during an infection at each infection site, it is not hard to see why local wild BC salmon can't survive with fry having to swim through disease at an early stage in their lives.

The Kennedy Lake sockeye run, decimated by DFO commercial authorized fishing, was wiped out in the 1990s and has never returned during the time that fish farms have been in Clayoquot Sound. This is not right.

Good luck Ahousaht for standing up on behalf of all British Columbians and for all wild Pacific salmon. I hope this becomes an election issue, which it should have been in the last election.

Here is a news report from CTV: http://vancouverisland.ctvnews.ca/video?clipId=701676.

And here is some breaking news from Chile: http://oceana.org/blog/ceo-note-expansion-harmful-salmon-farms-stopped-chilean-patagonia-community.

The problems they note are the same ones in BC, Scotland, Ireland, Tasmania, Norway, around the world really:

"Current practices employed in Chile’s salmon farms pollute the environment, destabilize traditional fisheries and harm populations of native species. Aquaculture facilities can be significant sources of pollution with excess feed, fish waste and dead fish dispersing into the surrounding environment. Captive salmon also often escape into the environment, where they can spread disease and prey on native populations.  The process of feeding farmed salmon is highly problematic. According to most estimates, it takes between three to five pounds of wild-caught Chilean Jack Mackerel, anchoveta, sardines, and other smaller species or forage fish ground into fish meal to produce one pound of farmed salmon. This practice wastes countless healthy seafood meals (which could be eaten directly in the form of these smaller fish) and has led to the overfishing of forage fish. 

Chile’s salmon industry is notorious for its increasingly excessive use of antibiotics to fight off bacteria and disease that threaten the stock. Antibiotic use rose 25 percent from 2013 to 2014 alone, according to government data, reaching a world record of 536,200 kg of antibiotics by the whole industry only in 2014. Norway, the main producer of farmed salmon in the world uses less than 1,000 kg a year. While Chilean officials maintain that quantities of antibiotics used are safe for human consumption, there’s widespread concern that overuse may cause human antibiotic resistance and harm marine environments.  Such concern has prompted several prominent companies in the U.S. food industry, including Costco Wholesale Corp., Whole Foods Market Inc. and Trader Joe’s, to partially or entirely phase out Chilean farm salmon, according to Reuters."

Here is my comment for the Chileans: Thank you for having the fortitude to take on the Norwegian multinationals, and the Chilean authorities. The problems you note are the same ones around the world and here in BC Canada. The same movement is happening today in BC, with the Ahousaht First Nations blocking Cermaq (from Norway) from opening the 22nd farm in their territory. See: http://fishfarmnews.blogspot.ca/2015/09/ahousaht-first-nation-stands-up-to.html. 

September 14, Nova Scotians Boycott Fish Farm Fish

Now, at the same time there are significant protests and progress eliminating in-ocean fish farms in BC and Chile, Nova Scotians are darn mad, too.

See:http://www.thechronicleherald.ca/letters/1310567-reader%E2%80%99s-corner-boycott-open-pen-fish-farming-products#.VfbNqaalmvg.facebook. 

" What is being done about the Doelle-Lahey report? Two lawyers pocketed a significant amount of taxpayers’ dollars to relay what every coastal resident already knew about the disastrous pollution, disease and poisons of ocean-based fish farms, seemingly to have their findings shelved by the Liberals. Doelle-Lahey insisted that all of the recommendations must be adopted to make the industry environmentally sustainable."