Fisheries Committee on Nov. 15th, 2010

[The Vice-Chair, Bloc, Raynald Blais]

Good afternoon. You are going to have to use your little earphones, because I will be speaking to you in French.

I thank you for your welcome and especially for your patience, as we are late because of all the snags we had to deal with during the past few hours. However, the important thing is that we are here, and so are you.

To begin the hearing, I am going to give the representatives of each of the groups—there are eight people but seven different groups—a maximum of four minutes each. I know that you had been told you would have five minutes. However, I am saying four because I know that people sometimes go beyond the allotted time. And so I am asking you to keep to four minutes, but do not be disappointed, because this gives the members more time to ask you questions. Please be assured that if I am asking you to be quite disciplined with regard to your allotted time, I will be asking my colleagues to do the same thing. I know for a fact that I have their cooperation to allow you to answer questions or to go on with the discussion. If at the end of the meeting, you still have some important points you would like to raise, please let me know and perhaps we can arrange something.

Moreover I would like to let you know that you will also have the opportunity, if you wish, to send us other written comments following today's hearing. If there are pieces of information or files you would like to send us so that we have more information when we study this topic, do not hesitate. The members of committee will be happy to hear from you if after today's hearing you want to send us your comments or touch on issues you did not have time to raise today. So feel free to communicate with us.

And now I am going to arbitrarily give the floor to the person whose name is first on my list , and that is Ms. Sonja Saksida.

Good afternoon. Please go ahead.

[Sonja Saksida, Executive Director, BC Centre for Aquatic Health Sciences]

Bonjour, and thank you for this opportunity to address your committee and to provide you with information from my organization, the B.C. Centre for Aquatic Health Sciences, BC CAHS, and to give you an overview of the knowledge that is essential, based on my research and experience, to your understanding of aquaculture specifically.

[The Vice-Chair, Bloc, Raynald Blais]

I am going to give you a little bit of advice in passing. When people read a written presentation, they generally have a tendency to go quickly. I would ask you not to go too quickly if you are reading a document, because the person I hear in my earphones may have problems, and then I will as well. So I would invite you to take the time you need to read your presentation, in the four minutes allotted to you. Thank you.

[Sonja Saksida]

Okay, I'll slow down.

The centre is a small not-for-profit organization located here in Campbell River, with a mandate for conducting research and providing services that contribute to the health of aquatic animals in the environment. BC CAHS started operation in 2005. It is unique, in that it's the only independent non-profit fish and aquatic health facility of its kind in Canada. The centre is very fortunate to have highly qualified researchers and technicians, as well as a well-equipped laboratory facility. Our strength lies in our ability to maintain a non-partisan approach that brings interested parties together to build scientific understanding and seek solutions that benefit all.

We have a board of directors, and its members represent the interests of various stakeholders, including academic institutions, environmental and conservation organizations, salmon aquaculture, shellfish aquaculture, and the fish health product industry. We believe that aquaculture provides good opportunities for coastal B.C., and its impacts can and should be recognized and mitigated to ensure healthy aquatic environments.

Our partners include government, the aquaculture industry, first nations, and environmental and conservation organizations. We feel that our role fills a critical gap between academic-based research, government agencies, and the industry and coastal community needs.

I have a BSc. in marine biology, a doctor of veterinary medicine degree, and a master of science degree in epidemiology. Epidemiology is the study of disease in populations. I have worked in association with the B.C. aquaculture industry since 1995, when I started as a veterinarian for a feed company. Since 2000 I have maintained a private aquaculture veterinary practice. I have been a researcher at CAHS since its inception in 2005, and in October 2009 took over the role of executive director.

Throughout my career I've worked with a variety of cultured species, including Pacific salmon, Atlantic salmon, rainbow trout, tilapia, sturgeon, black cod, and cobia; and a wide range of production facilities, including open-net pens, closed-containment systems on land and in water, and novel systems such as integrated multi-trophic systems. My interest is in ensuring that all current and future aquaculture development has a primary focus on fish health and welfare, as I believe the health of the environment and the fish are very much connected and interdependent.

Through my research, my knowledge of aquaculture in B.C. and globally, my connections with researchers, and access to results from BC CAHS projects and services, I have been fortunate to become uniquely positioned to discuss fish health and sea lice infection issues in farmed salmon, and the implications on wild populations.

Through my research and observations I can confidently state that fish health is well managed by veterinarians and fish health professionals in B.C. farmed salmon. Compared to other agriculture and aquaculture industries, there is considerable sharing of fish health data between industry and government, as well as very good oversight and auditing programs of both fish health and sea lice issues on farms. The audit program in British Columbia does an excellent job of verifying that infectious diseases indeed are very low in farmed salmon.

Even so, diseases from farmed salmon have been implicated as a potential source of the collapse of the Fraser River stock in 2009. Specifically, a virus named IHN has been implicated. This virus is natural to the coast of B.C. and has been found in wild Pacific salmon. However, IHN has not been detected in farmed salmon since 2003. Therefore it really can't be a factor in the collapse--at least the transmission of the disease from farmed salmon to wild. Unlike other jurisdictions, B.C. doesn't seem to see the same issues with sea lice on the farmed fish.

Why is this important? There has been a lot of interesting research in British Columbia, and it has shown that the species of louse here, lepeophtheirus almonis, is far less aggressive, and is actually a different species.

That's it.

[The Vice-Chair, Bloc, Raynald Blais]

Thank you, Ms. Saksida.

Mr. Atleo, you now have the floor.

[Keith Atleo, Lead Negotiator, Ahousaht First Nation]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I want to start off by thanking the first nations territory we're in today, and thank them for having us here to do this business today. It's the custom for our people to acknowledge that.

My cultural name is Kiista and my English name is Keith Atleo.

We are here representing the community of Ahousaht. We are part of the Nuu-chah-nulth Tribal Council.

We're here to speak about the policies and the regulations of DFO. As you're aware, we won a court case with DFO, and in the ruling the judge said that DFO's policies and management have failed the first nations. In our submission, which we have presented, we want to point out some of these things that have been brought out by the Supreme Court of B.C. with the fisheries litigation.

We also want to talk about the sockeye run in 2010. In 2010 the largest run of the Fraser River in history passed through our waters. The area G hook-and-line fishermen were always allocated the smallest share. In fact, most recent sockeye runs during this last decade have been poor. For conservation reasons we have fished only three of the largest runs. DFO normally builds a plan that allows a short opening at the first increase when the run is large.

We also traditionally access the Somass River sockeye by hook and line. Traditionally our people have used our oral history of our culture to know how large the runs were and the teachings that come from the nature side of our people over science. And it's been a proven fact. We've proven DFO wrong many times.

In 2010 DFO, in its varied run size, estimated and realized that there was a possibility of the largest run arriving. It was readily apparent in August. A huge test set in the Johnstone Strait began to indicate that the run would be large enough for the area G fishery on the west coast of Vancouver Island.

Our requests for the modest fisheries in the past DFO practice of treating all southern groups were simply ignored in 2010. The reason given for this was that it made biological sense.

DFO assigned personal and new demonstration fisheries inland and in development areas but did not assign any managers to build a contingency to allow for even a small fishery in our region. West coast troll management was available all season, but DFO ignored our areas, and designated priorities to areas and groups that favoured department privatization policies.

With regard to that, we do have some recommendations that are pointed out in our submission.

We are also here because we're a small community. Our people's livelihood is sea resources. You need to understand that we were put on a reservation by the Government of Canada, and our reserve is very small because we were told by the Indian agent that our access and our food source were that big ocean. But today we're being denied that access because of DFO policies and guidelines.

So we're hoping that this submission will help you look at some of the issues that our first nations and the communities on the west coast are going through.

Thank you.

[The Vice-Chair, Bloc, Raynald Blais]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Brown, it is now your turn.

[Dave Brown, Vice-Chair, Squamish to Lillooet Sportfish Advisory Committee]

My name is Dave Brown. I'm the vice-chair of the Squamish to Lillooet Sportfish Advisory Committee. I'm here today because of a fisheries working group that was formed with our local MP, John Weston. Our sportfish advisory committee wrote to John, expressing our concerns over the collapse of the Fraser River sockeye run in 2009 and the potential links to aquaculture. After receiving our letter, John suggested we form a fisheries working group.

Our group, which I represent here today, is made up of various members of our community who care for salmon. We have sport fishermen participating in our group, fishing guides, Squamish and West Vancouver Streamkeepers, Squamish first nations, North Vancouver Outdoor School, and concerned citizens. We have met several times with John, and he has carried our concerns forward to Ottawa.

In small part, our group led to Prime Minister Harper's decision to call for a federal inquiry into the collapse. I would like to thank and commend the committee for undertaking the efforts to learn more about the impact salmon farming is having on our wild salmon. You have a serious task before you, and we trust you will look closely into all measures that can be undertaken to prevent the spread of disease and sea lice to wild salmon.

We put forward a submission. We asked that the federal government look into funding for closed containment salmon farming to reduce impacts on wild salmon. We asked that the federal government make a substantial contribution to the establishment of a closed containment fund to foster innovation and advancement of new economically viable technologies and pilot projects. This would be a significant federal contribution from the 2010 fiscal year, combined with allocations from the 2011 budget. A contribution such as this would leverage contributions from non-governmental philanthropic sources and could conceiveably trigger a sizeable contribution for the province of B.C.

There are contentious problems with open salmon farming. The farmed salmon is B.C.'s single largest agricultural export product. The industry generates about $338 million per year in revenue and employs 2,100 people, primarily in coastal communities. In contrast, the commercial and sport fishing industries together employ about 9,700 people, with a total revenue of $1.2 billion. The problem lies with the salmon farming industry and its use of open-net cages. This technology clearly has negative impacts on wild salmon and other resources. This is a result of current farming practices. Current farming practices are one of the province's most politically divisive and contentious issues, an ongoing topic of heated citizen debate and voter angst.

The Squamish fisheries group is concerned about wild salmon and their economic value and the importance to local first nations. We wish to encourage our federal representatives to facilitate a win-win solution to this quagmire, one that sustains an improved industry and protects wild salmon and ocean health, creates new technologies, jobs, exports and opportunities, and positions Canada as a global leader in economically viable solutions.

As the marketplace increasingly adapts to sustainable seafood policies and consumer awareness bills, ecologically appropriate and economically viable production methods will only gain in importance. Future market access for Canadian farmed salmon will depend on the sector's commitment to innovation and improved environmental performance. The Government of Canada can play a critical role in ensuring this country's aquaculture products meet standards emerging from the increasingly rigorous international sustainability assessments and processes.

An overwhelming amount of published research indicates that open-net caged salmon farming poses a serious threat to marine ecosystems, wild salmon survival, and wild fish populations. Harm to wild salmon translates into harm to local first nations that depend on wild salmon, local constituents who enjoy fishing pursuits, and local businesses that depend on economic boosts from salmon-associated tourism.

Healthy businesses in B.C. coastal communities are linked to ecosystems in more than one way. In addition to relying upon the ecosystem to supply raw materials for the primary resource sector, the proceeds of these jobs trickle down to the support of numerous service industries. Wilderness tourism and recreational and commercial fishing combined employ thousands of British Columbians and generate over a billion dollars in annual economic activity. Wild-salmon-dependent industries are a vital component of the B.C. economy and our business sector that demands solutions to the threat posed by industry.

The Pacific Salmon Foundation, a government-mandated body formed by former fisheries minister John Fraser, conducted a multi-year $5 million research examination project, which included top-tier academics and government scientists, to examine fisheries management in B.C. as it related particularly to aquaculture. In May of 2000, a key final recommendation made to the government by the Pacific Salmon Foundation was to design and implement a commercial-scale trial of closed-containment systems for farmed-raised salmon.

[The Vice-Chair, Bloc, Raynald Blais]

Mr. Davis, you have the floor.

[Martin Davis, Councillor, Village of Tahsis]

My name is Martin Davis. I'm a councillor with the Village of Tahsis, and I wrote this letter on behalf of the mayor and council and the people of Tahsis.

Tahsis is a tourism-dependent community situated on the west coast of Vancouver Island in Nootka Sound. In the summer, large numbers of anglers come to Tahsis for the sport fishery here. There is also a small commercial fishing fleet that works out of the nearby community of Zeballos.

Most of our current economic activity revolves around the sport fishery. This fishery is enhanced by our volunteer-run fish hatchery.

Since the turn of this century, nine salmon fish farms have been established or enlarged in Nootka Sound. All are situated along major salmon migration routes. In November 2009 there was a significant outbreak of sea lice at two of the farms in our area. In one the contamination averaged 24 lice per fish, and at the other it rose to 41. These data, produced under contract to a fish farm company, were made available to the Tahsis council.

This outbreak was at levels unseen in wild fish and led to the removal of the farmed fish before maturity. Video and plankton net collection by an independent researcher clearly show enormous numbers of sea lice in the water surrounding the farm and attached to a boat. Farm workers have anonymously stated that the lice were resistant to the systemic pesticide Slice, which is used normally to kill them.

Fish farming in this area has had problems before, including high mortalities from summer anoxic conditions combined with plankton blooms. In 2004 mortality was 100%; the dead fish were taken offshore and dumped at sea, creating a 15-kilometre-long slick of rotting fish.

Salmon have apparently evolved their fall river spawning behaviour as a survival strategy to avoid contaminating their fry with sea lice when they hatch and leave the rivers in the spring, as sea lice are intolerant of fresh water. The presence of fish farms short-circuits this strategy by providing captive dense host populations of adult salmon that, when infected by lice, produce millions of lice larvae that attack the smolts as they migrate past the farms on their way to the open sea. While the fish farms here have recently responded to this outbreak by moving to a model in which the farms are harvested before the passage of smolts, this could only potentially work every other year, as the average grow-out period for farmed salmon is 22 months.

Tahsis council is extremely concerned with the impacts of these activities on wild salmon, which have been in decline for years in our region. Fish farms negatively affect our economy, which derives no employment or other benefits from them, despite their presence in our waters. The fish are also not processed in our region. They work at cross-purposes to our village fish hatchery by contaminating hatchery smolts when released into the wild. While smolts released from our hatcheries can be delayed until they grow to a more resilient size, the same cannot be said for wild smolts.

In conclusion, Tahsis needs to protect not just the wild salmon, but its own economic interests. After the closure of our sawmill and the subsequent downsizing of our local logging industry, we need to look after what we have left for our economic survival. With that in mind, we ask that the federal government phase out open-containment fish farms in Nootka Sound. While this may negatively impact the local fish farm industry, we propose that they relocate to Tahsis and build land-based closed-containment facilities there.

We know that this technology exists and is proven, and all it will take to move this forward is political will. We're willing to work with the seafood companies to find a solution that is mutually beneficial to all.

Thanks.

[The Vice-Chair, Bloc, Raynald Blais]

Thank you very much, Mr. Davis.

Mr. Novales Flamarique, will you be giving your presentation in French or in English?

[Prof. Iñigo Novales Flamarique, Professor, Biological Sciences, Simon Fraser University, As an Individual]

In French or in English, as you wish. Would you like me to give it in French?

[The Vice-Chair, Bloc, Raynald Blais]

The choice is yours, it is entirely up to you.

[Prof. Iñigo Novales Flamarique]

I'm going to give it in English, because there are more English-speaking people here.

Or I'll use both languages; that's it.

I'm here as an independent person. I would like to thank the committee for having invited me.

I'm a professor at Simon Fraser University. I've been studying sea lice biology and salmon biology for ten years or more. I've done this in Norway and also in various institutions here in North America.

I think that I am sufficiently competent to answer any question regarding biology and the impact these types of salmon aquaculture may have on the wild salmon populations.

Given my understanding of the literature and the studies that I have conducted, I could potentially make a good contribution on the impact that salmon farms could have on wild salmon populations, as well as answer any other questions about sea lice biology or salmonid biology.

Thank you.

[The Vice-Chair, Bloc, Raynald Blais]

Well done.

Ms. Cannon now has the floor.

[Barbara Cannon, Biology Manager, Creative Salmon Company Ltd.]

Bonjour. Good afternoon. My name is Barb Cannon, and I'm the biology manager for Creative Salmon.

I'll start by telling you a little bit about myself. I have a marine biology degree from Dalhousie University in Halifax. Although I'm originally from Ontario, following graduation I moved west to Ucluelet and started out whale watching and guiding sport fishing charters. Once I was settled and decided I'd like to stay on the west coast, I set out to find a career job, something I thought I could see myself doing for years, making a decent wage and giving me the opportunity to grow and challenge myself as a biologist. I've now been working with Creative Salmon for eight years, two and a half in my current role as biology manager.

A lot has changed in my life in these eight years, and I credit this to having a secure, well-paying job that I enjoy. I'm now married, the mother of two young boys, and I hope I can raise my family in an area that I've come to love.

Now I'll give you a brief overview of Creative Salmon. Our home base is Tofino, but our farms are located in Clayoquot Sound, a designated UNESCO biosphere reserve, and we operate within the territory of Tla-o-qui-aht First Nation. Creative Salmon is a Canadian-owned company, and we've been in business since 1990. This is our 20-year anniversary.

Currently we are North America's only major producer of chinook salmon and are fully integrated from egg to plate. That is to say, we raise our own brood stock, rear our own smolts, and harvest and process our own fish. Since our inception, our focus has been on quality, not quantity. We are a small player in the B.C. aquaculture industry, producing on average 1,400 metric tonnes per year, but take great pride in the product we produce.

Although we have six site locations, we operate only four farms at any one time. This gives us the flexibility to change locations and leave sites fallow for extended periods of time. Although we are not yet certified organic, it is our hope to soon become one of Canada's first organic salmon farming companies. Creative Salmon is a founding member of the Pacific Organic Seafood Association, and our current focus has been in the development of the national standards.

We feel that as stewards of the environment, it is our responsibility to farm sustainably. Despite substantial additional cost, we are committed to growing our fish as naturally as possible with the least possible impact on the environment. As I mentioned earlier, we grow only chinook and have committed to grow them in low densities without antibiotics in untreated nets and feed them a natural diet. In order to do this, we have strict fish health management and bio-security protocols, as well as stringent environmental monitoring practices.

Creative Salmon has a team of three biologists who keep close tabs on aspects of fish husbandry practices and environmental monitoring. We are proud to say that we have not had to treat our production fish with antibiotics since 2001. We also take a natural approach to our nets. They're untreated, and we clean them in situ, using net cleaners or with sunlight and salt water.

Chinook salmon do not respond well to stress, so our goal is to promote fish health and welfare, while at the same time minimizing any stress. We do this by limiting handling, ensuring proper diet, feeding techniques, and humane harvesting, and we make every effort to reduce predator interactions.

This issue of predator interaction is something we have focused a great deal of attention on in the past few years. Learning from our own experiences and consulting with marine mammal experts has given us a good understanding of sea lion behaviour, and we have modified our predator systems accordingly. We feel we've taken the necessary steps that have made significant improvements to our predator system, and with these improvements we've virtually eliminated predator interaction.

Sea lice are another issue, or should I say non-issue, which I would like to elaborate on. Chinook salmon are naturally tolerant to sea lice, and although we do monitor our fish for evidence of sea lice, we have never been required to treat them. Since 2003 we've been involved in a collaborative working group called the Clayoquot Sound Sea Lice Working Group, a collaboration of Tla-o-qui-aht, Creative Salmon, Ahousaht, and Mainstream Canada. This has been a very successful and rewarding experience and we hope this will continue.

I'm done? Okay.

[The Vice-Chair, Bloc, Raynald Blais]

Thank you very much.

Ms. Dane, you have the floor.

[Colleen Dane, Communications Manager, B.C. Salmon Farmers Association]

Thank you.

Good afternoon. My name is Colleen Dane, and I'm the communications manager with the B.C. Salmon Farmers Association, based here in Campbell River.

I know that you've already had in-depth presentations from some of our member companies, government regulators, and national aquaculture representatives during your hearings in Ottawa, so I thought that since you are here in the west coast home of the industry, I would talk a little bit about what salmon farming brings to British Columbians.

You've likely heard the number 6,000 when it comes to employment, direct and indirect, by the industry. Here in the north island, salmon farming is the area's largest private employer. With 2,800 direct jobs, we are providing steady, year-round employment in communities that have been hard hit by the downturn in other resource economies. Mayors of towns like Port Hardy, Port McNeill, and Campbell River here openly recognize that these jobs are key in their communities.

The B.C. Salmon Farmers Association represents five salmon producers and over 35 supply and service companies. Along with growing salmon, our members produce the feed, process the harvest, provide the packaging, transport supplies, and build the facilities. Around 3,000 companies, though, provide services and supplies to the industry. Nearly 400 of those are considered large suppliers, working with three or more of our member companies. It's a close, collaborative and innovative community and one that is really a pleasure to be a part of.

It's quite the ripple effect, too, that salmon farming is creating. Cluster developments like these are considered healthy effective strategies for rural diversification. It's strengthening best practices, building concentrations of expertise, deepening labour pools, and strengthening regional growth. Each related activity spurs on more economic strength, so that everything from non-profit organizations to scientists to specialty product suppliers can succeed.

B.C.'s farmed salmon is B.C.'s largest agricultural export. The 2008 wholesale value of the year's harvest was $495.2 million. Federally, it's second only to east coast lobster for our seafood export values. Exports of nearly 50,000 tonnes were estimated to be worth $330.9 million in 2009.

It's a successful product, though, because it's a good product. B.C.'s farmed salmon is a valuable source of important nutrients and is a healthy protein that's consistent, reliable and fresh. We have the lowest level of antibiotic use of any livestock and the most efficient feed conversion rates. Our fish are well cared for and very healthy and our farms are excellently managed.

All of this is being done under the most stringent regulatory environment in the world for aquaculture. While the upcoming regulatory transfer to the federal government means change, we only expect that high standard to remain and in fact increase as we work together to achieve the most sustainable industry possible.

We know that it's important to reach the highest standards. We recognize that public attention has helped to create this industry in making it as strong and accountable as it is today. As technology advances and the business environmental settings continue to adapt, so will we. For example, our technical committee at the association brings together staff from each company to improve things like biosecurity and fish health management plans, and we are actively engaged as a group at the Cohen commission that has opened in Vancouver.

The goal of the B.C. Salmon Farmers Association is to continue educating the public about all that we've done and continue to do. Our extensive public outreach, with programs like our public tours, which run every summer, and our regular food shows, has shown us that while people may have questions about the industry, the feeling of a vast opposition is really very localized. More and more, people are talking about the reality of global food security, sustainable energy supplies, and protection of freshwater resources, and in all of those lights, our ocean-powered net pen farms are a bright example of how we can feed people into the future.

The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization has said that 75% of the world's wild capture fisheries are at or near their maximum harvest rate. Yet by 2030, demand for fish is estimated to increase by 70%. Aquaculture is the way of the future. We believe that B.C. has a great opportunity to be a part of that worldwide solution. Places like Port Hardy and Campbell River here are helping to lead the way, so we appreciate you guys coming to meet us and talk today.

[The Vice-Chair, Bloc, Raynald Blais]

Thank you very much. I'd like to congratulate you not only for your discipline but also for your excellent cooperation. I know that I can expect no less from my colleagues.

We are going to start our question period. I'll explain how things work. The representatives of each political party present here, that is the Liberal Party, the Bloc Québécois, the NDP, and the Conservative Party, will put their questions in turn. They have a specific period of time to do so.

We will begin with the Liberal Party, with Ms. Joyce Murray.

[Joyce Murray, Liberal, Vancouver Quadra, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Vice-Chair.

Professor Flamarique, you suggested that you could answer questions from your background of studying sea lice in salmon. What's your view in terms of the aquaculture industry, sea lice, and the impact on wild salmon?

[Prof. Iñigo Novales Flamarique]

I'm going to speak based on the results of the literature, which is completely independent and carried out by scientists without any kind of leaning toward any side.

The studies that stand out are those carried out by a group from the University of Alberta, led by Krkosek. What these mathematical studies show is that sea lice from farms can indeed have a great impact on the abundance of wild salmon populations.

There was another study carried out by one of his collaborators named Alexandra Morton that showed that if you put sufficient sea lice--and by this we mean in the order of four or five on a very small fish--this could lead to an over 60% chance of mortality, compared with fish that are not infected or are infected at a very low level, like maybe with one sea louse.

Now the question is whether this factor of sea lice, which obviously in laboratory situations has a major impact on salmonid mortality, translates into being the major factor in the field to the mortality. There are several other factors that I think could be involved in the high mortalities or the decline of wild salmon populations, one of them being global warming, as well as potentially other diseases.

However, this is where the studies of Krkosek--several studies have come out--are important, and it's important to understand the mathematics behind them. The mathematics basically show that for a linear system, which considers most of the factors, including one part that takes into account the remaining factors, sea lice loads on the small juvenile salmon can only be attributed in the majority of cases to the farms, not to any other thing.

[Joyce Murray, Liberal, Vancouver Quadra, BC]

Professor, we've had testimony by the good scientist that you've mentioned. I'm wondering whether you've done independent research yourself on the...?

[Prof. Iñigo Novales Flamarique]

I've not done the mathematics, but I've followed them. I can follow them. I have a degree in physics. And I know that they're correct, for what it is. I know that his sampling, because I visited the Broughton Archipelago, was also good.

What I can tell you from my own experience is that we have loaded chinook salmon, approximately 30 grams in weight, with about ten sea lice, for the purpose of testing a live trap. We wanted to see whether the live trap would delouse the salmon. What I can tell you is that within about two hours, healthy chinook salmon, about 30 grams with a load of ten sea lice, looked moribund. They were not swimming very well in the tank. Obviously we carried controls in which we manipulated salmon in the same way, but without loading the sea lice, so it can only be the sea lice that are inducing this.

[Joyce Murray, Liberal, Vancouver Quadra, BC]

Thank you.

Ms. Saksida, your organization is of the view that the sea lice are not an issue. Is that correct?

[Sonja Saksida]

Yes.