Fisheries Committee on Nov. 15th, 2011

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

The steep decline.

[Bill Taylor]

Our federal government--Fisheries and Oceans--needs to reallocate much greater resources to wild Atlantic salmon conservation, restoration, and management.

We've looked at DFO's budget for wild Atlantic salmon compared to aquaculture. DFO's budget for wild Atlantic salmon management, conservation, enforcement, assessment, research, and so on was about $25 million in the mid-1980s. It was down to only $12 million just a few years ago. If you do a cost of living increase on that, it's a reduction not just of half but of about 75% over that time period.

So at a time when wild salmon numbers are dropping, DFO's budget for trying to take care of and restore those wild salmon runs is also in great decline. That's not to say that DFO does not have some great staff. We work very closely with the enforcement staff and research staff and so on. They're very dedicated people, but their numbers are getting smaller and smaller and their challenges are getting larger and larger.

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

If, for instance, the aquaculture industry were to move out.... Say there was a solution and that caused a shift in the industry to go closer to the market. That is essentially building on Mr. Kamp's suggestion that if it were closed containment, if it did move to a land base, and if it did move closer to the market.... What do you think that would do to the wild fishery, for instance? How would that impact the commercial fishers, the tourism, the recreation, and the sport fishers? What would it do if that shift did occur?

[Bill Taylor]

That's an excellent question. There is no commercial fishing for Atlantic salmon in Canada today. That was phased out through the 1990s because of great concern over our diminishing wild salmon numbers. In the areas of the southern Maritimes, the Saint John River, the Bay of Fundy, Nova Scotia, and southern Newfoundland, there is great opportunity and every possibility of success of restoring wild salmon numbers and bringing back a very lucrative recreational fishing industry, which, just like aquaculture, supports a lot of jobs in tourism in rural areas, in river communities, and coastal areas. I would see an increased opportunity for employment and increased economic generators because of that.

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

How much time do I have?

I'll ask a two-parter about closed containment. Do you think that would help mitigate some of these problems? I believe you alluded to that.

And of more interest, how close do you think a reasonable transition from open pen to closed containment would be for industry in your neck of the woods?

[Bill Taylor]

We certainly see closed containment land-based aquaculture as a way forward, and we also realize that a business model that makes sense needs to be built. As I said earlier, we're trying to put our money where our mouth is and actually work with industry, the conservation fund, whoever is interested in trying to build a business case and demonstrate that it works and it can be cost competitive. It will take time.

The first step should be a moratorium on further growth of the industry and anything new, whether it's grandfathered in or whatever term you want to use, until the transition is made. And that's going to take time.

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

You don't want to hazard a guess in terms of years?

[Bill Taylor]

A decade at least.

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

Also, as clarification more than anything, when you say “recreational fishers”, do you include the sport fishers?

[Bill Taylor]

The sport fishers, yes.

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

On the west coast, we distinguish between the recreational and the sport. The sport are often linked to the lodges, I believe that's fair to say.

So you would lump both of those categories or groups into the recreational fishing.

[Bill Taylor]

I would. On the east coast, we look at it--and I think DFO does as well--as having first nations fishers, who have a right to fish for food, social, and ceremonial purposes; the recreational or the sport together; and commercial. So the three fishers.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Thank you.

Mr. Sopuck.

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Marquette, MB]

Thank you very much, and thank you to our witnesses for being here. I'll admit my bias right up front. I am a proud member of the Atlantic Salmon Federation, and this summer I was also inducted into the Miramichi Salmon Association, having fished there for the first time this year. I'm beginning to have a deep and abiding affinity for wild Atlantic salmon. They're truly a remarkable animal.

Having said that, I also represent a rural area--admittedly in western Canada, but I wear a rural hat--so when I see the number of rural jobs off the coasts based on aquaculture, I find it very compelling. The ASF did some great work in years past to reduce and eventually help eliminate the commercial fishing of wild Atlantic salmon. Would you say that the increased aquaculture production makes the requirement to ever fish wild Atlantic salmon...that it would never happen again, because we produce enough fish through aquaculture?

[Bill Taylor]

Yes.

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Marquette, MB]

To me that's a very positive aspect of aquaculture.

You talked about escapes. What is the survival rate of the escapes? For example, we often stock fish. In the Great Lakes the salmon fishery has gone from Atlantic salmon fishery to Pacific salmon fishery based on stocking. So the notion of enhancing wild populations via stocking is a well-established practice in some situations.

Mr. Carr, what's the survival rate of the escapes, and will they eventually merge with the wild fish and become part of a wild run?

[Jonathan Carr]

First, the best hatchery is the river system itself, but there are circumstances where hatcheries are needed to try to help restore populations.

Aquaculture fish have been reared and kept domesticated for several generations now. In the early phases of our studies on the Magaguadavic River in the early 1990s, we believed the survival was quite good. When fish escaped they would get into the river system. We saw high numbers of fish getting into the river system, compared to what we thought had been escaping at the time.

Fast forward another 10 to 15 years, and the survival of fish, when they escape from the net pens, is very low. We estimate that maybe 0.1% or 0.2% of those fish that escape from the net pens make it into the wild streams. Going back to what I said earlier about being so domesticated, if those fish were to interbreed with the wild fish in the stream, studies have shown that it can be quite detrimental to the fitness of the offspring.

Some of these streams--we're monitoring the rivers--have as few as six or 10 wild fish going into the rivers, so it only takes one or two escapees into those river systems to spawn with the wild fish to effectively reduce the fitness, meaning that in subsequent generations it will be much harder for the fish to survive in the future.

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Marquette, MB]

I'm a little bit skeptical. If these farmed fish are that unfit, their survival rate would almost be nil. But that's perhaps an argument we can have at another time.

You're making the point that wherever there's aquaculture, wild Atlantic salmon stocks have declined. As you know in science, coincidence is not the same as cause and effect.

What kind of pathology has been done on individual wild Atlantic salmon in rivers near aquaculture pens? What exactly happens to wild fish, in your view? What does the data tell us?

[Jonathan Carr]

Do you mean in terms of their interaction or passing by net pens?

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Marquette, MB]

The accusation is always thrown at the aquaculture industry about disease, the chemicals that are used, and so on. The presumption is that that somehow affects the wild fish. What specific pathological analyses have been done on individual wild Atlantic salmon that can come up with a link between the two?

[Jonathan Carr]

The closest case we have to a link--again, it's not definitive--is with ISA and wild Atlantic salmon from the Magaguadavic River back in 1999. As Bill mentioned earlier, we've been monitoring this river since 1992. We don't typically take a wild fish out and do disease screening unless it comes up to our trap and is found dead or very injured in the trap.

In 1999, we had some cases of wild fish dying in the trap, and one of those fish tested positive for infectious salmon anemia, which decimated the New Brunswick industry in the mid 1990s. At the same time there were some aquaculture escapees in the trap that tested positive for ISA as well. ISA is very similar to a flu and is very contagious, so if fish come in contact with each other they can contract the disease. That's our closest relation, and we couldn't definitively say that particular fish caught it from the aquaculture escapee.

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Marquette, MB]

It seems to me that a lot more work needs to be done to separate coincidence from cause and effect.

You made the point that there are many reasons for the salmon decline. Do you think seals are part of the issue? A seal reduction program has been talked about. Would you support that as one of the tools in the toolkit?

[Bill Taylor]

As one of the tools in a very specific toolkit. Seals and cormorants and mergansers and salmon have coexisted forever, and there is survival of the fittest and a balanced ecosystem and so on.

There have been a number of research efforts made in trying to determine the actual impact that a huge seal population may have on wild salmon. In specific river estuaries, where there's a high concentration of seals on a Pacific salmon run, perhaps a seal cull is the way to go, but a widespread willy-nilly cull may not have any positive effect.

Coming back to the numbers—I guess I didn't make the point well enough, but I certainly tried in my presentation—the negative impacts of aquaculture on wild salmon, again well documented, and talks of disease and ISA and sea lice and pollution, and on and on.... The most critical impact is the genetic impact. While the vast majority of aquaculture escapees likely die shortly after they escape, the sheer number of the escapes.... Less than a year ago, this time last year, there were three big escape events in the Bay of Fundy. The reported escapes from the industry, by the provincial government, were in excess of 200,000 fish. So even if you only have 0.1% of those 200,000 fish, you still have 2,000 escapees, and we see them running up our rivers, like the Magaguadavic, where the aquaculture escapees each year for the last decade have actually outnumbered the wild run. It only takes a couple of meetings and a couple of generations before you begin to lose your wild salmon, your salmon runs.

I absolutely agree that we need clear science and we need definitive science. That's why the Atlantic Salmon Federation is again trying to be part of the solution, and we've been doing this work on the Magaguadavic for the last number of years. I don't want to pretend to know all the answers, but we can share with you what we do know and hopefully learn from past experience, and in many cases not a great experience.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Eyking.

[Mark Eyking, Liberal, Sydney—Victoria, NS]

Thank you, Chair.

It's good to be on the fisheries committee. Fishing is one of our top moneymakers in Cape Breton.

I'm from Cape Breton, and we used to have at least 10 good salmon rivers once upon a time. I think we're down to one, the Margaree, and it's not that robust. We would hope to see it come back.

A few years ago I went to Norway, and I attended a world aquaculture conference. Canada was present, but also Scotland, Iceland, and Norway, of course. They are also homes to Atlantic salmon and they do a lot of aquaculture. One of the things I saw them doing there was a fish farm that raised halibut. They had these big combs, like aquariums, and they got their water from the fjords, and they raised it to whatever temperature they wanted. That's where they took the level from. But it was interesting how they were raising halibut there. At that time they were thinking that maybe that was the way to go for halibut, and maybe other fish species--with aquaculture. But I know there was also a concern about the wild salmon cohabiting with aquaculture in those regions.

My first question is dealing with those countries, Iceland, Scotland, and Norway, because they have the same fish, Atlantic salmon, and they have the same aquaculture. Do they have different rules and regulations on how they manage what's happening in the different regions and bays than we do? Do they have a different system? How are they doing? How are the Atlantic salmon doing in these countries? Are they ahead of us, behind us, or where is it at?