Fisheries Committee on Nov. 15th, 2010

[Keith Atleo]

We have about 900 people who live in our community. We have about 100 people who work out on the farms, but we also have members who live in Port Alberni who are from Ahousaht, and we have community members in Ahousaht who work in the processing plant in Tofino. So it fluctuates during the year. It depends on when they're harvesting, so that number goes up and down. I think it's about 175 jobs, roughly.

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

Okay, and some are part-time, some are full-time.

And the answer to finding out what was going on with the Fraser run this year and the big spike, of course.... The elected people wanted to bring in 25 lawyers to find out what the problem was. When you have a problem with fish, you bring in lawyers. It's natural.

What is the traditional wisdom on the spike? And let me say this. If anybody wants to comment on the fish farms being detrimental and adding to the downfall of the stocks of late, square that with the big spike this year with the run on the Fraser. What is the traditional sense on what took place there this year?

[Keith Atleo]

I would have to ask my uncle....

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

If you're comfortable in rendering an opinion on that.

[Sidney Sam Sr.]

I'm no scientist, by any means; I'm not a biologist. No, sir.

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

But there would be traditional—

[Sidney Sam Sr.]

I was talking to an elder prior to coming here, and he tells me that sockeye stayed in one place, in the warm water, and there was a lot of feed there, so they didn't migrate like they normally do for four years and then come back. But that one year they didn't, and he said “They're back here”.

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

It's the warmer water temperature.

[Sidney Sam Sr.]

Yes. The temperature of the water makes a lot of difference.

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

I'm sure we'll get the skinny from the Cohen commission.

[A voice]

From all those lawyers.

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

Barb or Colleen, could you give us some kind of indication as to what you feel? I'm sure that closed containment has been something your industry has talked about for a while, and the economics of that, so are you guys able to share with us how you feel closed containment would impact on the price per pound or whatever?

[Colleen Dane]

I don't have numbers on price per pound or what that would mean. Right now, the technology isn't there to be able to transition the industry, at the size that it is, onto land. The technology is being used in our hatcheries, obviously, so some farmers are actually leading the way on closed containment recirculation facilities. But there is a lot of work that still needs to be done before that technology could be available for the industry as it is.

Then there are other questions, I think, that also need to be answered about whether or not it's then a viable option. Economics is certainly one of them, but there are other ones about the other environmental impacts that it would be introducing and about energy usage and the kind of footprint that a facility like that would be requiring. It's estimated that 7,500 football fields would have to be cleared to make room for the industry as it is now.

Also, there's fish health. The veterinarians on our staff raised concerns about what that would mean, especially if consumers are paying more and more attention to the treatment of their animals. Those fish would obviously have to be kept in higher densities and constantly in recirculation facilities, so they wouldn't be able to have that natural rest period that the tide offers them.

So there is a lot of work still to be done, but the industry is definitely there and looking at it and being a part of it, while also trying to balance that with making sure that our industry as it is now is being run to the highest standard.

[The Vice-Chair, Bloc, Raynald Blais]

Thank you very much.

Thank you, Mr. Cuzner. Thank you also for the compliment, that is always appreciated.

Mr. Donnelly, it is your turn.

[Fin Donnelly, NDP, New Westminster—Coquitlam, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I just wanted to go back to Randy's comment for a second, the comment about the prediction, the Krkosek prediction of pinks: that they would be extinct by now. I think the last part of the sentence that needs to be included in that is “given the current practices at the time, left unchanged”.

What happened was that it was a trigger, and I believe the industry started to use a pesticide, Slice. I know that I don't have a lot of time, and that's where I would like to go. I was going to ask Sonja to comment on that. If we have time, we'll come back to it, but we're also restrained and have the same frustration with the lack of time here.

The question I did want to ask, which Mr. Cuzner raised, is just building off Mr. Davis's comments about moving to closed containment and having the political will to move to closed containment. If there were a recommendation to move to a closed containment system--and this is to Colleen--I'm wondering if your association would support such a recommendation.

I'd just like to add as well that I have visited one of Marine Harvest's farms. I've taken a tour and listened to the presentations. I have heard and seen I think first-hand some of the improvements in the management that I've heard about over the years. It certainly seems like there have been many improvements, so this may or may not be a further iteration of improvements down the road.

I guess one last comment to add is that we're going to be visiting a U.S. farmer in Washington State in a day or two. There's an operation that has moved to closed containment. Is there any worry that the U.S. market may be getting out ahead of the Canadian market?

[Colleen Dane]

I'll start with the last question.

That facility produces a very, very small amount of salmon compared to the B.C. industry or other salmon-farming producing areas around the world. It's a good project to be out there. We're definitely paying attention and keeping an eye on whether it can work and expand, but we're not feeling a market threat at this point about that particular project.

There was a question about whether or not....

[Fin Donnelly, NDP, New Westminster—Coquitlam, BC]

I am sorry, I think I attributed it to Mr. Davis, and I meant Mr. Brown. I think, Mr. Brown, you were giving us the challenge. If that challenge were to come forward in the form of a recommendation from the committee after its work, is that something the association would support?

[Colleen Dane]

We'd support encouragement toward cooperative work and research toward that, but a recommendation that demands the time or forces the industry that way, without the support behind it to direct that innovation, wouldn't be supported by the association.

[Fin Donnelly, NDP, New Westminster—Coquitlam, BC]

I have a follow-up question. I think there were 16 recommendations that came out of the Pacific Salmon Forum. A number of years ago one of those was to move to closed containment, so I'm assuming that you didn't agree with those recommendations back then either.

[Colleen Dane]

I can't talk to you of those recommendations. I'm still fairly new with the industry. There has been research work and work that's been done to develop relationships as we move toward innovation and research in closed containment technology, so I wouldn't say that recommendations have been ignored. But these things take time and development and work to build relationships as we move forward.

[Fin Donnelly, NDP, New Westminster—Coquitlam, BC]

Given that I haven't heard the bell yet, Sonja, do you want to comment on Slice and the use of Slice? I think from the remarks earlier, you were wanting to comment.

[Sonja Saksida]

Your comment was that when you corrected Randy Kamp, I guess it was, on the comment about the demise of the pink salmon run.... Actually, I did the original work on Slice and the use of Slice in the industry. I've been tracking that since 2003, which is when the provincial government set up the treatment triggers, and they haven't changed. What we're seeing in the lice and pink salmon and on the farm may be how they use Slice, but the frequency of use hasn't changed.

[The Vice-Chair, Bloc, Raynald Blais]

Thank you very much, Mr. Cuzner.

Before giving the floor to Mr. Kamp, I would like to provide a bit of information. You alluded to one of the forum's recommendations. I am simply going to read it: design and test a commercial-scale closed containment salmon farming experimental system. The recommendation specifies that, while suggesting the immediate creation of an independent technical committee entrusted with recommending specifications for a close containment, commercial salmon farming demonstration project. They also suggest that as soon as the technical parameters have been agreed upon, the provincial government, in cooperation with other interested parties, publish a request for proposals for waste recovery by the demonstration project, so as to reduce the risk of contaminating the natural environment or the fish, and thus reduce the risk of disease. And that is it.

Mr. Kamp, you have the floor.

[Randy Kamp, Conservative, Pitt Meadows—Maple Ridge—Mission, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I appreciate you pointing that out. I was going to do that too. The forum's recommendation wasn't sort of a large scale, it's all moved toward closed containment. It was about trying to figure out whether a project could be put in place to prove whether it was viable and so on.

I have one question--maybe Mr. Cannan has one or two as well--and it's for Dave Brown. We've spoken before, and I appreciate the work that you and your group do and all of the similar sport fish advisory groups and others. I know you have strong feelings about the saving of wild fish, and we do appreciate that. You have some strong feelings about the impact of aquaculture on that. Do you work as passionately on other things that will definitely have negative impacts on wild fish, things like forestry and agriculture, water-use plans, industrial development, and so on? There probably is consensus that those kinds of things have serious negative impacts on aquatic ecosystems if not regulated carefully. Are you involved in that kind of thing as well?

[Dave Brown]

Yes. Actually, it's interesting that you bring it up. By no means am I standing here today saying that the link to salmon farming is the sole answer to the decline of salmon on the west coast and the impacts that might have; there certainly are other issues. I myself was personally on the Cheakamus Water Use Planning Committee, but I'd rather talk about our group and the group that we formed with John. Through John's encouragement and time, we started meeting initially discussing the collapse of the Fraser sockeye and potential links to aquaculture. Further to that, our group started looking at improving habitat.

Specifically in our area we're looking at the Squamish River watershed. Through funding that was made available through the federal government we've been able to accomplish some projects in our area. We've carried forward some additional habitat proposals that we believe will increase salmon returns to the Squamish River watershed, which actually is made up of five rivers.

We had a meeting of our group about ten days ago. We went out and looked at one of our projects, which was a salmon spawning side-channel. At that time, there was a viewing platform that had been set up. The day that we went there, we observed people coming down to view the wild salmon, which were spawning chum salmon. It was quite a spectacular thing. There were young children; there were adults—that type of thing.

I think education and habitat improvement constitute one of the key factors for improving our salmon numbers. Certainly that's something that shouldn't be overlooked by this committee. We don't want to just focus on one issue, but I believe that if we can take tiny steps along the way and all work together as a group, we can achieve big things. That's what our small group started out doing, and we've achieved some things that are, I think, quite substantial—little steps that can be built on to make substantial steps.

But I feel it's important that we look at minimizing impacts on wild salmon, and that's why our committee felt that it was a good partnership to bring forward, to try to encourage the two sides to work together and look for closed containment as one option.