1 of 1 2 of 1 Earlier this month, I joined with leaders representing over 120 First Nations, commercial fishers, tourism operators, business leaders, recreational fishers, scientists, and environmental NGOs at a press conference to send a clear message to Prime Minister Trudeau: we expect him to keep his promise to transition open-net pen salmon farms out of BC waters by 2025. It’s a rare thing to get such a diverse spread of often diametrically opposed organizations together in one room, standing up for one cause. It speaks to the issue’s critical importance to the vast majority of British Columbians.
As the co-founder of a Vancouver-based community-supported fishery called Skipper Otto , I represent a network of more than 40 fishing families and 8,000 member home cooks across Canada who depend on wild salmon for our way of life, our living-wage jobs, and our local food system. Long before open-net pen salmon farms, there were community-based fishers and workers who thrived on wild-capture salmon and the myriad shoreside businesses that supported them. Since salmon farms were brought into our waters, we’ve seen a steady decline in wild salmon numbers.
This has happened everywhere in the world where open-net pen salmon farms exist. There is ample peer-reviewed research on the parasites, pathogens, and pollutants that are released from open-net pen salmon farms into BC waters—and the subsequent deadly impact on wild Pacific salmon. It was in part due to this clear scie.
