Yes. This is Ruby Berry, from the Georgia Strait Alliance.
I'll just briefly address the question of whether we think DFO is using the precautionary principle in the process. I would have to say no.
We have a huge weight of evidence showing us that for juvenile fish passing the farms, there is significant danger from sea lice and for the potential of disease. There's a great deal of evidence showing potential for damage from the waste.
The response from DFO tends to be that it's not proven and that they haven't seen definitive science on it. We would disagree. There's an extreme weight of evidence showing us that there is significant potential for damage to the fish passing by and to the local fish stocks.
One of the things we all know is that effects on salmon are multitudinous. Many things affect the health of the wild salmon in their migration. There's pretty clear evidence that this is potentially one serious problem. If DFO were to take a precautionary approach, we would see this issue being taken far more seriously.
I'd also like to address the question of Wild Salmon Narrows. This is a name that's been coined to describe the narrowest passageway between Quadra Island and the neighbouring islands in the northern Georgia Strait. It is one of the passageways that juvenile salmon from the Fraser River use; my understanding is that about 80% of the fish pass through this general area. Both reports from local fishermen and traditional knowledge tell us that the juvenile Fraser salmon pass through there in great numbers, using the bays and protected areas along the passageway to stop and feed and rest before making their way farther north on their way out to the open ocean.
In that very narrow passageway through the archipelago, there are currently five active salmon farms. They contain close to five million farmed fish. What we've seen is a high incidence of sea lice. We expect that there's a potential for disease being transferred to these juvenile fish.
We would like to see this passageway cleared as an interim measure, with the intention of moving these farms into close containment. It would be an emergency measure so that at least there would one passageway for the Fraser River juvenile salmon to use in making their way out to sea.