Fisheries committee  To answer your question, at the moment the jury is out as to whether net pens can be brought to a level of not having an impact on wild salmon in particular or on other parts of the environment. The fundamental issue there is disease transfer. There has not been enough research a

Fisheries committee  To be more precise, the DFO study estimate was that it took 18 full-time people to run a closed containment farm, versus 10 for a net pen. I thought the numbers would be closer together, actually, but when I've talked to anybody who's in the net-pen industry they've told me that,

Fisheries committee  That's a complicated question, because there are multiple reasons for the decline. But if I were to list them.... I'm sorry that I don't know them beyond the British Columbia circumstances, but here it's a matter of protecting our wild salmon streams from agriculture and logging

Fisheries committee  I will give one answer first and then pass it to Andy. In fact, land-based aquaculture is a huge industry around the world right now, but it has only newly moved to the opportunities with salmon. There are other species—tilapia and barramundi are examples—that have been well de

Fisheries committee  What I was saying was about the weight of evidence of the science. There has always been quite a controversy on the B.C. coast with regard to the scientific studies, but when you look at the vast majority of studies--those looking at the impact of sea lice in particular, which ha

Fisheries committee  I could start with that. First of all, most of the closed containment developers to date have been smaller companies that are not part of the traditional net-pen industry. We were very pleased to see that Marine Harvest Canada took a different route and did a full engineering st

Fisheries committee  Those jobs certainly are creating employment right now in coastal communities, but I certainly have talked to people who would prefer to live in their own community and go home every night to their families. It's not one or the other. What we're saying is that it could be produ

Fisheries committee  I'll just speak in regard to the commercial prawn fishermen with whom we have contact. The extra waste on the floor can give more prawn abundance, but whenever there is an application of this pesticide called Slice, they're reporting that the prawns are not there at all. There ar

Fisheries committee  The issue there would simply be how many sea lions and seals we're talking about. There is a large population of sea lions and seals in British Columbia and they do eat a lot of wild salmon. The public in British Columbia has quite an aversion to marine mammals being shot. When n

Fisheries committee  There are two comments I would have on that. First of all, this is why we believe that moving to closed containment is a real solution, because it eliminates the problem of disease and sea lice. Second, as far as open-net pens are concerned, when they're using various pesticid

Fisheries committee  That has been the case. It is certainly a major disaster as far as disease is concerned in Chile. It crippled that industry for a number of years. In terms of the sea lice issue on the east coast of Canada, in every jurisdiction where fish are in the ocean, there have been these

Fisheries committee  No, they would be using disease-free eggs or smolts, depending on what stage was being introduced. There is no ability for disease or parasites to come onto the site. As Andy said, it's a biosecure site, so it's a completely different circumstance, and the operators that we kno

Fisheries committee  Yes, it opens up new opportunities. A number of developers on the coast want to use saline water; they want a salt component. There are others who want to do it with just fresh water, and that can be done in any part of the province or any part of Canada.

Fisheries committee  That is correct.

Fisheries committee  First of all, it was an illusion by the salmon farming industry that the current rural jobs would move to urban centres. We believe that won't be the case, for a number of reasons. First of all, it is very suited to rural communities, and it's in rural communities now that you h