Tag Archives: Fish farm litigation

Rivers & Oceans

Two year renewal of fish farm licenses

Fisheries and Oceans Canada announced a two-year renewal of licences for marine finfish aquaculture facilities outside of the Discovery Islands. 

“I have mixed opinions about the announcement. I think there’s some good things and there are some not so good things,” said Stan Proboszcz, senior scientist with the Watershed Watch Salmon Society. “They received a license for two years based on these conditions and those conditions are rules that the salmon farms need to follow. Part of the problem is, we actually don’t have a copy of those rules yet.”

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Rivers & Oceans

B.C. fish farms cultivate increased risks for wild salmon, new studies show

National Observer, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

Pacific salmon are likely exposed to increased risks from pathogens concentrated in fish farms on the West Coast, two new scientific studies indicate. 

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Rivers & Oceans

Court ruling doesn’t sink Ottawa’s decision to close Discovery Islands salmon farms, critics say

Click here for ‘Federal court rules DFO breached salmon farmers rights to procedural fairness’

National Observer, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

West Coast environmental groups and First Nations opposed to salmon farming are urging the federal Fisheries Minister Joyce Murray to hold the line after a recent court ruling set aside a decision by her predecessor to phase out salmon farming in the Discovery Islands. 

The Federal Court ruling found then-fisheries minister Bernadette Jordan contravened the right of procedural fairness owed to fish farm companies when deciding to shut down 19 operations in the waters near Campbell River on eastern Vancouver Island by the end of June. 

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Justice, Rivers & Oceans

Federal court rules DFO breached salmon farmers rights to procedural fairness

On Friday, April 22, 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 operations in the Discovery Islands by June 2022. 

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Rivers & Oceans

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

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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