Tag Archives: Alexandra Morton

Before the Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans: Was DFO’s ‘minimal risk’ assessment a cover-up?

May 18, 2022 Roy L Hales Leave a comment

(Click here to access other presentations taken from the Committee.)

At the May 12 session of the Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans, Stan Proboszcz, senior scientist at the Watershed Watch Salmon Society suggested that DFO covered-up some of its own research when it concluded fish farms pose ‘minimal risk’ to wild salmon. He said they appear to have reduced the number of science risk assessments from 10 to 9 because the evidence indicated sea lice harm wild sockeye.

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Indigenous Nations, Rivers & Oceans

Hereditary Chiefs flotilla protesting Raza Island fish farm

May 12, 2022 Roy L Hales Leave a comment

Editors note: Cortes Currents was notified that this event has been put on hold due to an illness. They plan to reschedule it in the near future.

The Hereditary Chiefs of the Laichkwiltach, We Wai Kai and K’omok First Nations will be taking a protest flotilla to the Raza Island fish farm on Saturday, May 14,2022.

“We three Hereditary Chiefs have jurisdiction and have the right to stewardship over the waters and lands of the Laichwiltach Nation, unceded waters and lands of the Discovery Islands,” wrote Hereditary Chief George Quocksister Jr of the Laichkwiltach First Nation on his facebook page.

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Indigenous Nations, Rivers & Oceans

Cermaq Canada reoccupying Raza Island fish farm

May 10, 2022 Roy L Hales Leave a comment

It has been three weeks since a federal court ruled that former Federal Fisheries and Oceans Minister Bernadette Jordan breached the rights of B.C. salmon farmers to procedural fairness, when she ordered them to phase out their operations in the Discovery Islands by June 2022. Now Cermaq Canada is returning to its site on Raza Island.

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Rivers & Oceans

47 days until a decision must be made: sea lice and pathogens

April 18, 2022 Roy L Hales Leave a comment

As we get closer to June 30, when the Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) has to decide whether to reissue the licenses for 79 British Columbian salmon farms, independent biologist Alexandra Morton points to yet more problems.

A recent Global and Mail article revealed the existence of a decade old Department of Fisheries (DFO) report about the ‘transmission of the PRV virus from farmed to wild salmon.’

Morton said the fish farm industry has exceeded the three lice per fish threshold every week since the out-migration season began on March first. Two to five active farms have exceeded that limit every week, for the past five weeks. Morton claims that no sooner had the industry brought the lice on one farm under control, than another exceeds the limit.

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Indigenous Nations, Rivers & Oceans

The First Nations calling for a renewal of fish farm licenses

April 2, 2022 Roy L Hales Leave a comment

Editor’s note: The licenses for 79 fish farms will come up for renewal by the end of June, 2022. If the Department of Fisheries fails to reissue them, there will only be seven farms left in the province. These are all in the Broughton Archipelago and their licenses come up for renewal in 2023.

On March 21, a group of what was supposedly 17 First Nations supporting the fish farming industry put out a press release. Cortes Currents is not on the First Nations for Finfish Stewardship email list, and at that point had not heard of the group. We subsequently asked Dallas Smith, spokesperson for this coalition, for an interview. When he did not reply, Cortes Currents published a write-up largely based on that original press release. Within hours of posting a link through social media, someone directed Cortes Currents to independent biologist Alexandra Morton’s Facebook page where there was evidence that this group of 17 was at best 12 and more likely 11 First Nations. Since then, the list has grown smaller.

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As Broadcast over CKTZ, Whats Current on Cortes and Beyond