Fisheries Committee on Dec. 8th, 2011

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

I call this meeting to order.

I'd like to take this opportunity to thank Professor Brauner for taking the time out of his busy schedule to join us today. Thank you very much, professor.

I'm not sure if the clerk has advised you on some of the procedures here with our committee, but generally we allow about 10 minutes for presentations by our guests. We have some time constraints for questions and answers in the interest of fairness, to try to make sure we get as many questions in as we possibly can.

Having said that, please don't be offended if I interrupt you at some time, or one of the members tries to make sure we're proceeding along as planned.

At this point in time, I would ask you to proceed with any opening comments you may have.

[Dr. Colin Brauner, Professor, Department of Zoology, University of British Columbia, As an Individual]

Great. First of all, can you hear me?

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Yes, we can hear you very well. I should have asked you that to begin with, I guess.

[Dr. Colin Brauner]

It's a pleasure to be here today.

As a bit of background, I am a professor in the Department of Zoology at the University of British Columbia. I am a biologist, specifically a physiologist, who studies how animals adapt to different environments and, in essence, how animals work. I study fish, which as species represent half of all vertebrates on the planet and live in almost every aquatic habitat. So they are a marvellous group to investigate environmental adaptations. Salmon of course are very impressive in their migratory ability and in their ability to transfer between fresh water and sea water, which is a great challenge that only about 3% of all fish are capable of doing. While much of my research program is focused upon basic research, I also conduct research related to aquaculture, particularly geared toward making it more sustainable, as is the case for many of my colleagues in zoology at UBC. Research into the biological requirements of cultured fish is really applied physiology, my main interest, and the biological requirements of fish are of course very important in intensive culture of any species.

Land-based closed containment aquaculture is technically possible, but it's economic feasibility is a topic of debate. What is clear is that profitability is dependent on optimizing water quality and the biological conditions for growth of salmon at high densities. Recirculating aquaculture systems, abbreviated RAS, are unique in aquaculture in that they provide an opportunity to completely control the environmental rearing conditions, such as salinity, temperature, ammonia, carbon dioxide, and density, all of which can greatly influence growth. Complete control over these conditions allows salmon to be reared under optimal conditions, promoting fish welfare and product quality, maximizing growth and economy of production. While the conditions that result in adequate growth in some salmon species, such as Atlantic salmon, are reasonably well described, conditions for optimal growth for any salmon species, especially at high stocking densities, are largely unknown. Defining the truly optimal conditions that maximize growth and increase food conversion ratios in closed containment aquaculture is crucial for the long-term success of the industry.

There are currently two facilities that conduct this sort of research, the Freshwater Institute in West Virginia and Nofima in Norway, both of which conduct world class research on Atlantic salmon requirements. To provide this sort of information catered to the specific needs of British Columbia and Canada, Western Economic Diversification has partnered with UBC, with an application pending to Tides, to develop an initiative for the study of the environment and its aquatic systems, abbreviated InSEAS. InSEAS is a world-class aquatic research facility currently being built and consisting of a team of internationally recognized fish biologists and physiologists. The overall goal of InSEAS is to define water quality parameters, like salinity and temperature in particular, but also ammonia, carbon dioxide, oxygen, pH, and other conditions like density and alternate diets, all of which result in optimal growth performance and the welfare of salmon at all life stages of development, from juvenile to smolt to adult, and all of which may have different requirements for a given species or strain of choice for land-based closed containment aquaculture. This information can then be used in economic forecasting of the costs and benefits of using these optimal, or maybe sub-optimal, conditions in land-based closed containment aquaculture.

For example, relatively little is known regarding the optimal salinity for rearing salmon in closed containment aquaculture. Salmon regulate their blood electrolyte levels at approximately one-third seawater, a process that requires energy. Here, it has been proposed that if electrolyte regulation is expensive energywise, with some estimates as high as 20% of resting metabolism, optimal growth may occur at an intermediate salinity between fresh water and seawater values. There is interest in rearing salmon at intermediate salinities in closed containment aquaculture in B.C. However, there have been no systematic studies designed to determine what salinity would be best, which has an influence on site selection, system design, and profitability. If a chosen salinity improved growth and/or feed conversion by 20%, this would have great significance for fish production, which would have to be balanced by the cost—or possibly the savings—of rearing fish at that salinity.

InSEAS is designed to derive the relationship between salinity, growth, and other indicators of performance in any salmon species through the use of seven independent RAS systems, each with replicated tanks. A similar approach can be taken for temperature, where we know that different species, and even strains of that species, have quite different optimal temperatures, which remain largely unresolved.

All research performed at InSEAS will be conducted in partnership with industry and government agencies. Through membership of the InSEAS Scientific Facilitation Board, the aquaculture industry will assist InSEAS researchers in identifying knowledge gaps that potentially limit profitability of land-based closed containment salmon farming. We will partner with industry through applications to research partnership programs, such as the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council, NSERC. However, these do not currently have programs specifically directed toward aquaculture and, more specifically, closed containment aquaculture. They also require industrial support, which is difficult in the current climate.

A source of funding specifically geared to closed containment aquaculture would greatly enhance the rate at which information can be generated and disseminated to industry to increase Canada's competitiveness in the marketplace for the emerging technology of land-based closed containment aquaculture.

Thanks very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Thank you very much, Professor.

I'm going to start off with our line of questioning.

We're going to go to Mr. Sopuck first.

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

Great.

Thank you very much, Dr. Brauner. I really appreciated your presentation.

I noticed that you appear to have done some work on the effects of open aquaculture on wild salmon stocks. Am I correct?

[Dr. Colin Brauner]

The two areas we've mostly focused on are the effect of alternate diets--that is, increasing plant-based food sources in diets for rearing salmon--and looking at the effect of sea lice on juvenile pink salmon, which has been an area of concern in British Columbia in particular. So through our work on sea lice, I guess there are implications for ocean stocks.

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

Do you feel that you're qualified to speculate on the effect of net pen aquaculture as it's practised off the coast of British Columbia and its effects on wild salmon stocks?

[Dr. Colin Brauner]

I think the real challenge is that we need a lot of information to make inferences on how wild stocks are being affected. In order to study the impact of something like aquaculture or any anthropogenic activity on the environment, we must first have a thorough understanding of the baseline conditions. This can only be achieved with continuity in research funding to appropriately monitor the environment in space and time. Of course, there are a lot of things that need to be thought about in that regard, but once we know what the baseline conditions are, we can start looking at how any industry impacts the environment.

I think one of the biggest challenges in assessing the impact of current aquaculture practices is not really having sufficient information on which to draw solid conclusions. There's always a danger in looking at correlations of inferring cause and effect without fully understanding the system you're looking at. What we need to get at that is funding to maintain the capacity to monitor, but also to quickly deploy scientific expertise to address critical issues as they arise, because they do vary depending on the system.

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

I couldn't agree more with your caution that we shouldn't mistake correlation with cause and effect. What we've heard from many of our witnesses, from what we loosely call environmental activist groups, was their immediate and positive assertion of the negative effects of aquaculture, as if the question had been completely settled and now it's time to move on and deal with it. So your caution as a scientist is greatly appreciated.

As for your research on food sources for aquaculture, I see you've done some work on replacing fish oil with canola oil for growth. What percentage of the feed can be canola oil, or some other plant-derived protein?

[Dr. Colin Brauner]

That's great.

Our research has focused solely on the oils. Other people have been looking at proteins, so both of them are important. In terms of our work on oils, we were interested in chinook salmon early in development, and we found that we were able to replace up to 75% of the anchovy oil in the diet with canola oil, and there was no negative effect on growth, no negative effect on swimming performance and their ability to transfer from fresh water to sea water, and their ability to tolerate low oxygen tensions. We looked at a whole list of performance indicators and we were really quite surprised that we were able to change that much of the lipid. Of course, that has large implications for aquaculture, because much of the feed comes from wild fish ground up into pellets. If we can make those pellets go three or four times further, in terms of lipids at least, that will feed quite nicely into the sustainability of aquaculture.

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

To me, that's a remarkable achievement. I represent a rural prairie constituency that has thousands and thousands of acres of canola grown every year, so it's nice to hear of another use for it.

In your view, how limiting is the supply of wild fish protein as feed for aquaculture? Is there a ceiling beyond which the industry can't grow, in terms of accessing wild fish protein as feed?

[Dr. Colin Brauner]

I think that's a great question. If we think of the wild stocks that currently exist, many of them are being fished close to maximal capacity. Some are in decline, others are doing reasonably well. But I think we are approaching a point at which we are limited in the amount of fish that we can draw from the ocean to, in this case, convert into fish pellets. Anything that can be done to make that fish protein and lipid go further through alternate lipids, or improved growth efficiency, is what I think the industry is very interested in for this exact reason. The cost of fish proteins is going up as well.

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

Is there something inherent in salt water fish protein that makes it uniquely suited as food for aquaculture? As you know, there are thousands of kilograms of what we call rough fish in fresh water Canada, the carp and the white suckers and, of course, the Asian carp and so on. Is there any potential to turn those species into fish protein as part of the feed stock for aquaculture?

[Dr. Colin Brauner]

I would imagine there would be. One of the bigger challenges of eating an animal that lives in a very different environment is that its composition could be very different. But fresh water fish have a fairly similar composition to sea water fish in terms of their ion content, for example, which is something we're quite interested in. The specific fatty acids, for example, that are building blocks for things like omega-3 fatty acids that we know a lot about, and omega-6 fatty acids, may differ, but it seems to me that it would be a completely reasonable line of research to at least pursue. If we can feed them plant-based protein, I would think a fish-based protein would only be better.

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

My time is up, but I would be very interested in following up with you on that at a later date.

Thank you very much.

Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Thank you, Mr. Sopuck.

Mr. Donnelly.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and I'd like to thank you, Dr. Brauner, for being here at committee and providing your testimony today.

I was wondering if you could tell us why the university is interested in examining closed containment.

[Dr. Colin Brauner]

That's a great question. There are a number of reasons.

The researchers more than the university per se are interested. Several of us are really interested in what limits the performance of fish. We do a lot of work studying how animals adapt to different environments, and the possibilities are quite amazing.

Something like closed containment is interesting because here you have a system where you can manipulate the environment a fish lives in and look at the effect of that environmental manipulation on the animal, and why certain things limit performance. For example, in the case of salinity, we're very much interested in the evolution of salinity tolerance and how fish move from fresh water to sea water, and that kind of thing. We're also interested in why performance is ultimately limited at some salinity in different species.

There's a basic research component that we're interested in, but the other thing is that it's a way of applying our knowledge to something that's of direct relevance to the public. So I think that most of us believe that sustainable aquaculture, or any way we can increase the sustainability of aquaculture, is a good thing.

The role of aquaculture—sorry did you...?

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

I was just going to jump in. I have a number of questions I could fit in my seven minutes, if I could.

[Dr. Colin Brauner]

Yes, absolutely.

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

Talking about sustainability, I don't know if you can answer this, but if you can make a guess or offer a position or an opinion, what in your opinion is the most sustainable fisheries method if you had to choose from three: the wild caught; the current open net pen method of aquaculture; or closed containment aquaculture, let's say using the RAS system?

[Dr. Colin Brauner]

Sure, and that's a great question.

Part of what we've been thinking a lot about is that with increased populations, we need more protein, and fish is a valuable source of protein. If we want to provide that protein source through fish, then you have the wild fisheries or you have aquaculture. I think most people feel that the wild fisheries are currently being fished to their maximum capacity and, in some cases, beyond.

The ability to draw more protein from that source is not an option. In well-managed systems, I think that's a nice, sustainable form of fish production, to get to your question. If we want to increase protein production beyond what the wild fishery can supply, then it has to be aquaculture, and then the question is what is the more sustainable way to go?

Industry responds a lot to public perception and, clearly, something like aquaculture is a hotly debated topic. Often people choose a side: It's either good or bad. I'm a firm believer that there's a huge middle ground that that needs to be discussed. I'm always a bit disappointed in how the media focuses on whether it's good or bad. Closed containment, in this form today, is moving into that grey area to get at more sustainable aquaculture.

In open net pen culture, a lot of practices are changing to improve its sustainability, which is a great thing. Certainly looking into and working with closed containment is a great way to go. There are pros and cons in both. Closed containment has a much higher energy requirement than open net pen farming, but again you have the ability to regulate environmental conditions very tightly, and that can promote fish welfare.

To answer your question on which is more sustainable, I think it's difficult to say. It's early days with closed containment, and what's happening with it is exciting. It has a lot of potential, and I think we'll learn a lot as we go. That's one of the things that has us interested in closed containment. A lot of the public perceptions of the negative aspects of net pen aquaculture can be satisfied, and we'll have to see what sort of challenges appear as closed containment aquaculture moves forward.

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

Okay. Thank you.

This committee is hoping to get down to the Freshwater Institute and take a look at what they have. What would you recommend the committee look for or ask about when seeing what their facility has to offer?

[Dr. Colin Brauner]

First, the facility is quite an impressive one. I think that one of the biggest challenges, as you've heard from many people, is probably the cost of closed containment. Many of the people at the Freshwater Institute are engineers and are very well versed on the proper technology or the cutting edge technology on cost. So I think the cost of designing a system would be an important question to ask.

They're very interested in using fresh water. Their system is only set up for fresh water rearing, but they've been able to rear Atlantic salmon in fresh water. So getting some feedback on what the pros and cons are of rearing Atlantic salmon in fresh water, I think, would be a very useful line of questioning, as well as asking about density. They've been doing some great work on density and are able to rear fish at much higher densities than other people thought possible, largely because they have such nice control over their water quality.