Fisheries committee  We've heard the aquaculture talk, and it's basically two statements. One is that lobster landings are up; the other is that aquaculture has been around and has been growing at the same time. What they have failed to prove is any causality, that one causes the other. You may very

Fisheries committee  If we put it into a land-based closed containment system, we could take it completely out of the hands of DFO. Right now what we have is a department that has to make a decision around siting a farm in an area, and it actually has to ensure that the fish and the water quality in

Fisheries committee  Actually, it's interesting. I had another slide in here, but I had 10 minutes.... That slide would have demonstrated it. There are eight sites that are multi-trophic, which means growing seaweeds and mussels next to salmon farms with the expectation that the mussels will gobble

Fisheries committee  Absolutely, yes. I'm not—

Fisheries committee  Absolutely, and it may be widely acknowledged and it may be widely trumpeted, but I can show you evidence that it does not work.

Fisheries committee  It has been. I've participated in scientific advisory reviews that DFO has sponsored or has organized around impacts of salmon aquaculture. There is an admission that the waste discharge from these farms has a small and potentially large ecological footprint. The question is how

Fisheries committee  Currently when an industry wants to site a fish farm somewhere, they have to go through an environmental assessment process, a federal as well as a provincial process. DFO has developed a decision support system. Basically, there's a checklist and a scoring system of factors that

Fisheries committee  It depends on several factors: the length of time the fish farm has been in operation, the size of the farm, and the current conditions in the farm area. It is interesting that my Crow Harbour site was only in production for 18 months, yet I didn't see a complete recovery for t

Fisheries committee  A report was released earlier this year by a researcher at the University of New Brunswick who interviewed traditional fishermen, who have obviously fished for 30 or 40 years. There is a very distinct pattern that fishermen observe when fish farms go in. Initially when the farm g

Fisheries committee  I think other countries are beginning to eye this because they do see it as what the consumer is demanding. There is some consumer pressure to produce salmon in a way that doesn't harm the environment, that could avoid the use of pesticides and antibiotics, because in closed cont

Fisheries committee  Currently there are several species that are grown in closed containment systems in Nova Scotia. It's a technology that is used to raise smolt. It's salmon. Before they are put into open-net pens, they're grown in closed contained systems on land. It's just a matter of transferri

Fisheries committee  Back in 2000, there were already the beginnings of some technology development in closed containment. What I think is remarkable, and it has happened in the last 11 years, is that we're actually now talking about recirculation systems, so that closed containment systems are not c

Fisheries committee  We haven't, but it would be interesting for you to know that we appeared before the Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans in 2000 when it was discussing the sustainability of the aquaculture industry. At that time, we called for transitioning the industry to closed containme

Fisheries committee  I have to tell you that the only example I have to go by in how quickly technology can develop is based on my history. And this may not be an appropriate comparison, but it's certainly one that shows that when there is a regulatory sort of drop-dead deadline, the technology devel

Fisheries committee  Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'd like to thank the committee for inviting me here today to give this presentation. My name is Inka Milewski. I'm a marine biologist, and I'm the science advisor for the Conservation Council of New Brunswick. I've been working in the field doing resear