Fisheries Committee on Oct. 27th, 2011

[Alistair Struthers]

No. For the net pens, you'd be looking at probably 15 kilos per cubic metre.

[Mike Allen, Conservative, Tobique—Mactaquac, NB]

About 30 pounds, so three market-size fish, as opposed to ten market size fish for the same cubic metre in the closed containment, if you're looking at—

[Alistair Struthers]

Yes, if you're looking at number of fish—

[Mike Allen, Conservative, Tobique—Mactaquac, NB]

So there's quite a difference in the number of fish in that per cubic metre size.

Now, that leads me to my next question. Have there been any reports or studies done on tilapia from a fish health standpoint? But maybe more importantly, you talked about fish performance. What have been some of the issues for tilapia and those warm water species when you start getting up into that range?

I was saying to Mr. Kamp the other day that at 50 kilos per cubic metre, it's almost like we could walk across the tank on top of the fish. What are some of the challenges for fish performance?

[Kevin Stringer]

I'll throw that unfairly to Jay.

[Dr. Jay Parsons]

Thank you.

I'm not all that familiar with tilapia production issues, so I won't be able to comment extensively on that particular question. But we can certainly get back to you with further information.

One comment I will make, though, is that stocking densities vary quite a bit among species—and I'm not sure, Alistair, if you know the figures for tilapia.

Behaviourally, different species of fish can perform and grow optimally at different stocking densities. Arctic char, for example, and I also believe tilapia, can grow naturally and perform quite well at quite high stocking densities, whereas certain fish, for example Atlantic salmon, don't perform as well at higher densities as some other species.

In terms of specific issues related to tilapia, my understanding is that there are the same types of issues in general around the performance of the fish in respect of their food conversion ratio, their growth, husbandry, and health management. These are the main concerns for tilapia.

[Mike Allen, Conservative, Tobique—Mactaquac, NB]

Okay, thank you.

In the land-based systems that you indicate on slide 13 of your deck, I'm assuming that the recirculating aquaculture system would be set up in a similar fashion to that. Are any of these land-based systems that we know about all close to a major water source, like a lake or an ocean?

[Alistair Struthers]

Slide 13 is actually a land-based flow-through system. By their very nature, based on the fact they are flow-through systems, they do need to be next to a high-quality water source. Likewise with slide 14 on the recirculating aquaculture systems, they also require a high-quality water source. So if you're talking about salt water systems, then yes, they need to be close to a salt water system. If it's a freshwater system, then the portability or the range in geography is a little bit larger at that point.

[Mike Allen, Conservative, Tobique—Mactaquac, NB]

What we heard the other day is that each one of these would be approximately 10 hectares in size at a site like this. So we're talking in excess of 20 acres that you'd need as an appropriate water source at a site by the ocean or a lake. I think one can raise salmon in fresh water. The question would be, as part of these demo systems, are we talking about salination systems going with these as well, depending on where they're located?

[Alistair Struthers]

The recirculating aquaculture systems that we looked at were specifically for saltwater Atlantic salmon. We didn't look at any type of artificial salination of the water, such as Instant Ocean. If you were to look at something like that, I think the costs would be prohibitive.

[Mike Allen, Conservative, Tobique—Mactaquac, NB]

Okay, thank you, sir.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Thank you, Mr. Allen.

Mr. Kamp.

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

Thank you, Chair.

Let me ask a couple of questions that are more or less unrelated.

My first question is that in both your report and your testimony, as well from the testimony of officials yesterday, it has been pretty clear that your analysis shows closed containment systems, at best, to be minimally feasible from an economic point of view. And I think you make a compelling case about that.

Dr. Andrew Wright, whose work sure you're familiar with, appeared before us as well—although several months ago now. Can you explain why he was less certain about that in his work? In fact, he showed a sort of acceptable rate of return for a land-based recirculating system. Did he apply different assumptions, or can you explain that for us?

[Kevin Stringer]

I think that's the answer to the question, that it largely depends on the assumptions you start with. As for the variables that we're throwing into this, I've mentioned a few of them, but I'll mention a couple more.

So much depends on what you're putting in as the price of salmon, and so much depends on what the rearing density figure is. Are you going with a 3:1 ratio compared to net pen, or 2:1 compared to net pen, or 4:1 compared to open-net pen?

The capital costs depend very much on where you're actually building this thing and the trucking costs, etc.

The exchange rate is an enormous factor. Whether you're successful economically depends very much on that going up and down, simply because I think 85% of this is exported to the U.S.—though I don't remember what the figure is.

It presumes the availability of a suitable location with access to a quality water source. We assume access to a large power grid. We assume there are roads, and all those types of things.

Different feasibility studies have landed at different places. They all land at different places, we think, because they all start with different assumptions. But based on what we've seen so far--and we need demonstration projects to prove this--they also land with an understanding that the costs may come down with practice, with economies of scale, with learning new techniques that we haven't thought about, with practice, and those types of things.

I think those different assumptions that go into it largely explain the differences.

Alistair.

[Alistair Struthers]

To add to that as well, we commented on Dr. Wright's study and he commented on ours. He actually sat on our technical advisory committee. There was some back and forth on the assumptions used, and we agreed to disagree on the assumptions.

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

Good. That's helpful.

The short final question is from me.

DFO has gone through the interesting challenge of creating a full-fledged regulatory framework in British Columbia, due to the requirements resulting from a court case, as you know.

Now DFO manages that. In that new framework, with aquaculture, do we still have an all-in all-out framework where for 22 to 28 months, you can grow this many kilograms of salmon? Or do we do it differently now under this new regime?

I guess the basic question is whether that kind of regulatory framework would be optimal for, say, a closed containment style of aquaculture? Or if there was a different regulatory framework tweaked in a different way, would that change the likelihood of closed containment being feasible?

[Kevin Stringer]

It's a good point and one that I think we would want to contemplate.

The current regulatory framework, I think you're suggesting, and it's absolutely accurate, presumes the current arrangements with open-net pens. In fact, one of the things we are doing is working with industry and others on what are called integrated management of aquaculture plans, IMAPs. These would look at regional planning so that you will have an appropriate following in the same region, whether it's the west coast of Vancouver Island or whatever cluster you're talking about. That all presumes that it's an open-net pen, because with closed containment, you wouldn't look at some of those things.

So I think you would look at the regulatory system. Certainly some of the licence conditions would change for closed containment. We do have some closed containment systems, and the license conditions are different.

I think it would be good to look at what the regulatory regime might tweak if you were to go in that direction.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Thank you very much.

I have one question, Mr. Stringer. It follows up on Mr. Donnelly's question about the impacts aquaculture might have had on traditional fisheries. You referenced southwest New Brunswick in answering that question.

To follow up on that reference, in southwest New Brunswick, aquaculture is a relatively young industry. It was introduced into that area in the early 1980s. The traditional or main fishery in that region would be lobster. I'm wondering whether there has been a decrease in the stocks or the catch from that area since the introduction of aquaculture. Or has there been an increase?

[Kevin Stringer]

You know, I don't know the answer to that question. But in thinking about southwest Nova Scotia in particular—and here I'm not sure what the numbers are for southwest New Brunswick—the numbers have been very good in the Bay of Fundy.

You're right that it is a new industry and that relationships are still developing, but I believe the numbers have actually increased, and certainly since the early nineties when the industry started.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Thank you very much.

Thank you very much for appearing before our committee today. You have given us a lot of information in a short period of time, and we certainly do appreciate that. Hopefully we can reserve the right to ask you to come back again. I'm sure there will be follow-up questions as we proceed along this path the committee is pursuing.

Once again, on behalf of the committee, I want to thank you all for coming.

The meeting is adjourned.