Poll - 75% of BC Residents Against In-ocean Fish Farms

Insights West, the Pacific Salmon Foundation and Wild Fish have done a poll of environmentall issues in BC and found uniformly high response to all of them.

See: https://www.insightswest.com/news/pacific-salmon-july2021/.

Of the five major environmental issues facing the province that we asked BC residents about, British Columbians are most concerned about declining salmon stocks and endangered species, even more so than climate change and single-use plastics. The level of concern about declining salmon stocks (86%) and endangered species and at-risk ecosystems (82%) are the top two concerns, concern for climate change (76%) and single-use plastics (75%) rate 10 points below. The negative impact of logging on nature and climate (72%) also rates highly but below the others.

And: "Recently, the Canadian government mandated all open-net fish farms be transitioned to closed containment pens by 2025, and the vast majority (75%) of BC residents support this decision."

And: Steve Mossop, President of Insights West [says] “Our polling results show that perceptions of open-net pen fish farms are very negative, and the vast majority would like to see the transition to land-based fish farming in BC.”

Added to this Tony Allard, chair of Wild First, says: “Concern for declining salmon stocks is 10 points higher than other well known environmental issues in BC at 86%. Importantly, British Columbians express very high support, at 75%, for transitioning away from open net pen fish farms now. I couldn’t agree more.”

This survey agrees with a past one, that 75% of BC residents want fish farms out of the water.

It is in a major post on fish farms, and is reference 8 in that post: http://fishfarmnews.blogspot.com/2019/07/dfos-public-consultation-on-framework.html.
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Here is another article on the recent Insite poll: https://www.insightswest.com/news/pacific-salmon-july2021/.

Here is their lead stats: "BC Residents Are Extremely Concerned (86%) About Declining Salmon Stocks As Well As Climate Change (76%) and Single Use Plastics (75%), and Most British Columbians (75%) Believe That Open-Net Salmon Pens Need to Be Transitioned to Land-Based Pens.