MITSUBISHI INVESTS IN ‘GIGAFACTORY’ CONCEPT TO EXPAND LAND-BASED FISH FARMING.
Mitsubishi, which owns global salmon farming giant Cermaq, has an international network of around 1,300 companies.
Intrafish
26 October 2024
Japanese conglomerate Mitsubishi Corporation has made an investment in Finnish aquaculture technology company Finnforel to grow the company's land-based trout farming concept globally.
Finnforel's strategy is built around its Gigafactory concept, which integrates land-based fish farming and processing under one roof, aiming to create industrial scale production with maximum efficiency and sustainability.
‘I WON’T BELIEVE IT UNTIL I SEE IT HAPPEN’: COULD A BAN ON SEA FARMS SAVE CANADA’S SALMON?
A row over sea life, lice and livelihoods is dividing communities as the government plans to end open-net pen farming in British Columbian waters
The Guardian - Shannon Waters, Tofino - Canada
3 October 2024
On a clear August morning, Skookum John manoeuvres his fishing boat, Sweet Marie, out of the Tofino harbour and into the deep blue waters of Clayoquot Sound on Canada’s west coast.
On shore, the late summer sun shines on visitors from all over the world who have flocked to the bustling fishing town on Vancouver Island, where they wander in and out of surf shops, art galleries and restaurants and pile into small boats in the hope of glimpsing orca, humpback and grey whales.
‘LIKE DOOMSDAY’: WHY HAVE SALMON DESERTED NORWAY’S RIVERS - AND WILL THEY EVER RETURN?
North Atlantic populations are at a historic low, and this year 33 of the country’s rivers were closed during the fishing season as salmon farming and the climate crisis threaten the fish’s future
The Guardian - Miranda Bryant, Trondheim
29 August 2024
“What is Norway without the fjords and the mountains?” asks Ann-Britt Bogen from her candlelit kitchen, the wild Gaula River flowing by outside the window, the hillside covered by low-lying cloud. For centuries, the river, which runs 153km (95 miles) from the mountains near the Swedish border to Trondheim fjord, has attracted salmon – and fishers – year after year.
But this spring the salmon, particularly the medium and larger-sized fish, did not come back from the ocean, raising such alarm over the collapse of the salmon population that the river, along with dozens of others in central and southern Norway, was abruptly closed for the first time.
Visitors cancelled their plans and stayed away, leaving the area, which revolves around salmon fishing, feeling “like doomsday”, according to Bogen, who runs Gaula Fly-fishing Friends and has a fishing lodge on her family farm. The river will now be closed until 31 August when the season ends. “Without the salmon, Gauldalen is just a valley – an empty valley.”
SKYE FISH FARMS REFUSED PLANNING PERMISSION
BBC
8 August 2024
Revised plans for fish farms on Skye's north-east coast have been refused planning permission - four years after the original proposals failed to secure consent.
Organic Sea Harvest had sought approval from Highland Council to build 10 salmon cages near Flodigarry and another 10 at Balmaqueen.
The previous proposals for 12 cages at each site were refused permission by councillors following a vote, and later by a Scottish government-appointed official after the company appealed.
Highland Council planning officials had recommended approval of the new plans, but councillors voted to refuse permission.
RSPCA PRESIDENT DEMANDS CERTIFICATION BODY SHUTS DOWN SCHEME FOLLOWING FOOTAGE OF MOWI FARM
Salmon Business
16 July 2024
“I’m asking the RSPCA to shut down and review the RSPCA Assured scheme. It’s clearly not implementing a standard of welfare which is acceptable in the UK in the 21st century.”
Naturalist and television presenter Chris Packham has threatened to resign as President of the The Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA) due to concerns over salmon welfare at Scottish fish farms.
The RSPCA is a charity organization that promotes animal welfare in England and Wales. It was founded in 1824 and is one of the oldest and most prominent animal welfare organizations in the world. The body’s certification program RSPCA Assured sets standards for the welfare of farm animals. Farms, abattoirs, and food processing plants that meet these standards can use the RSPCA Assured label, indicating that the animals have been treated humanely.
The move by Packham comes after covert footage revealed salmon with severe injuries at a farm run by the world’s largest salmon farmer, Mowi.
AS WIMBLEDON 2024 GETS UNDERWAY, WILDFISH IS PLEASED TO NOTE THAT NONE OF THE TOURNAMENT’S MENUS INCLUDE SALMON.
Wildfish
2 July 2024
A legal firm is seeking £382m on behalf of British consumers from some of the world’s largest salmon producers, which are accused of price fixing.
Legal action filed this week at the competition appeal tribunal said UK consumers overpaid for at least four years because of alleged breaches of competition law by the fish firms Mowi and its subsidiary Mowi Holdings, SalMar, Lerøy, Scottish Sea Farms and Grieg.
UK CONSUMERS SEEK £382m FROM SALMON PRODUCERS IN PRICE-FIXING CASE
Law firm’s case against six Norwegian-owned fish companies is over alleged breaches of competition law
The Guardian - Sarah Butler
22 June 2024
A legal firm is seeking £382m on behalf of British consumers from some of the world’s largest salmon producers, which are accused of price fixing.
Legal action filed this week at the competition appeal tribunal said UK consumers overpaid for at least four years because of alleged breaches of competition law by the fish firms Mowi and its subsidiary Mowi Holdings, SalMar, Lerøy, Scottish Sea Farms and Grieg.
CANADA TO BAN OPEN-NET PEN SALMON FARMING IN BRITISH COLUMBIA
Environmentalists hail decision to end practice in five years but aquaculture industry warns of 6,000 jobs at risk
The Guardian - Campbell MacDiarmid
20 June 2024
Canada will ban open-net pen salmon farming in British Columbia coastal waters in five years, the government has announced, a decision that has been welcomed by environmental groups but opposed by the aquaculture industry.
The Liberal government made the decision in 2019 to transition to closed containment technologies to protect declining wild Pacific salmon populations.
“Today, we are delivering on that promise and taking an important step in Canada’s path towards salmon and environmental conservation, sustainable aquaculture production, and clean technology,” said Jonathan Wilkinson, natural resources minister.
There are dozens of the farms in British Columbia. More than half of wild salmon stock populations are declining in the province’s waters, according to the Pacific Salmon Foundation.
SALMON-FARMING GIANT FACES BILLION-DOLLAR LAWSUIT
"It's pure fraud. It's totally illegal," the plaintiff's lawyer, Brendon DeMay, told HuffPost.
Huffpost - Roque Planas
7 June 2024
North America’s largest farmed salmon producer defrauded the U.S. government by hiding ownership of a controversial fishing fleet with a history of flouting federal authorities, according to a recently unsealed lawsuit.
The lawsuit adds a new dimension to a longstanding fight over the environmental impacts of aggressively harvesting menhaden from U.S. coastal waters. Conservationists have campaigned for years to limit menhaden fishing in the Chesapeake Bay, arguing that overharvesting the small, fatty fish too close to shore imperils marine wildlife that depends on them, including predatory fish, ospreys, bald eagles, dolphins and whales.
CRABS, KELP AND MUSSELS: ARGENTINA’S WATERS TEEM WITH LIFE - COULD A FISH FARM BAN DO THE AME FOR CHILE?
The Guardian - Mark Hillsdon in Ushuaia, Argentina
9 April 2024
A rocky path, strewn with thick tree roots, leads from a dirt road down to a small green hut overlooking the choppy waters of the Beagle Channel, a strait between Chile and Argentina. The shack is home to Diane Mendez and her family but doubles as Alama Yagan, one of nine restaurants in the fishing village of Puerto Almanza.
The village, in Argentinian Tierra del Fuego, has become a foodie haven, and the final stop on the king crab route, a trail that starts in the provincial capital Ushuaia, 45 miles to the east. But things could have been different.
In 2021, the provincial government voted to ban intensive salmon farming in Argentinian waters, after campaigners successfully argued that it would wreak environmental havoc, close down local fishing fleets and threaten the established nature-tourism sector, which employs 16,500 people.
“Everything in the sea has benefited from the ban on industrial salmon farming,” says Mendez. “The whole ecosystem was saved, from the crabs to the seaweed; they all depend on a healthy Beagle Channel.”
‘RSPCA SHOULD BE ASHAMED. THEY ARE JUST GREENWASHING SCOTTISH SALMON’
Charity insists welfare changes are not enough
The Sunday Post - Dawn Thompson
25 February 2024
A leading animal charity is embroiled in a row over supermarket salmon welfare standards after campaigners said new rules to protect fish don't go far enough. The RSPCA Assured scheme is designed to reassure consumers that animal produce, including farmed salmon, comes from sites which meet strict welfare rules.
Last week the charity unveiled more than 300 new standards and changes, hailing them as "a huge step for-ward" for fish welfare.
Salmon farmers and producers pay £700,000 a year for scheme membership, which covers nearly all Scottish sites. However, campaigners accused the charity of 'green washing" the industry amid record deaths on Scottish fish farms plagued by parasites and disease.
SALMON FARM OPERATIONS MUST BE REVIEWED AS MATTER OF URGENCY
We need far-reaching and speedy reform of the fish farming industry.
Scottish Greens
2 January 2024
The Scottish Greens have written to the Rural Affairs secretary Mairi Gougeon calling for urgent talks on tackling problems in Scotland’s under-fire salmon farming industry.
Rural Affairs spokesperson Ariane Burgess MSP says increasing numbers of farmed fish deaths, disease and suffering in Scotland’s waters are seeing conditions deteriorate amid delays in delivering hope for changes demanded by experts.
The Scottish Greens have previously called for a moratorium on salmon farm expansions but agreed to work within the Scottish Government and industry on improvements as part of its power sharing agreement.
But Ms Burgess says communities and environmental campaigners are becoming more and more frustrated with what they see as a lack of progress. She now wants to put those concerns to the Minister.
ALGAL BLOOM IN CHILE CAUSES MASS SALMON MORTALITY, SALMONES CAMANCHACA REPORTS ALLEGED SABOTAGE EVENT
Seafood Source - Chris Chase
4 January 2024
Chile’s National Fisheries and Aquaculture Service (Sernapesca) has reported a new harmful algal bloom event in the country's southern Aysén region that has already caused mortality impacting over 2,800 metric tons (MT) of salmon.
On 2 January, Sernapesca reported an algal bloom northeast of Isla Victoria in Chile’s Aysén region. The event, the authority said, is impacting salmon farms in the ACS-22B Salmonid Concessions Group, where salmon-farming firm Blumar has had to activate contingency plans due to the presence of the microalgae Pseudochatonella spp.
Sernapesca added that AquaChile has also seen impacts at its Melchor 7 Center due to the same algae. All told, across the two farming areas, there has been 2,854 MT worth of mortality.
SHOULD YOU EVER EAT WILD SALMON?
The Spectator - Prue Leith
25 November 2023
When I say ‘Scottish salmon’ what do you see? I bet it’s a muscular 20- pounder flashing up a river, or a silver grilse leaping out of the water for the sheer joy of it. I bet it’s not a flabby beast, covered in sea lice, possibly half-choked by micro-jellyfish in its gills, living in waters so polluted that the seabed beneath, contaminated by salmon poo, is lifeless.
Fish kept in cages in comparatively calm loch waters do not get the exercise they need to firm up their flesh. They look good, pink and pretty, but their raw flesh is so soft you can spread it like butter. Fish kept in open sea cages and swimming against rough seas will have firmer flesh, but these farms are perhaps worse: when seals or storms tear open the cages, thousands of salmon escape.
AS MANY AS 890 TONS OF SALMON KILLED BY ALGAE AT A SINGLE SITE
Salmon Business - by Editorial Staff
22 November 2023
The number of salmon killed by an algal bloom outbreak in Chile has now reached an estimated 1,500 metric tons, according to Chile’s Fisheries and Aquaculture agency, Sernapesca.
Sernapesca reports that 100% of the salmon mortality from the Reloncaví Estuary has now been removed.
BJORK TURNS UP THE VOLUME IN ATTACK ON INDUSTRIAL SALMON FARMING IN OPEN PENS
Icelandic singer condemns ‘terrible suffering’ of salmon farming with proceeds from her new single with Rosalía going to activists
The Guardian - Karen McVeigh
21 November 2023
The Icelandic singer Björk has condemned industrial salmon farming in open pens as “extraordinarily cruel”, as she announced her debut song with the Catalan singer Rosalía, which will be available on Tuesday 21 November.
The pair will donate the proceeds of the single, a love song based on a recently recovered recording Björk made two decades ago, to activists opposing the controversial industry in Iceland.
SEA-LICE OUTBREAK ON ICELANDIC SALMON FARM A ‘WELFARE DISASTER’, FOOTAGE SHOWS.
The Guardian - Karen McVeigh
Images of severely diseased, dead and dying salmon at an Icelandic fish farm, obtained by the Guardian, have been described by one veterinary expert as an “animal welfare disaster” on a scale never previously seen.
The drone footage, shot last week over an open-pen sea cage in the country’s remote Westfjords region, shows salmon suffering from such a severe infestation of sea lice that huge numbers of the fish are having to be prematurely slaughtered.
Up to 12 pens are believed to be affected by the parasites, which contained about a million fish last month, although the exact numbers have not been confirmed. A specialised vessel, the Hordafor III, sent from Norway to euthanise the fish, is seen in the footage.
THOUSANDS OF SALMON ESCAPED AN ICELANDIC FISH FARM. THE IMPACT COULD BE DEADLY.
The Guardian - Karen McVeigh
30 September 2023
Clad in black waders, Guðmundur Hauker Jakobsson jumps into the River Blanda, whose freezing waters run down from the Hofsjökull glacier. Armed with a net, he casts around the ascending pools of the river’s fish “ladder”, built to aid wild salmon migrating up this powerful waterway from the sea.
Within minutes, he pulls out a 15lb silver fish, which thrashes and writhes against the net, then another, then another – five in all. The wild salmon of the Blanda here in north-west Iceland are some of the largest and most athletic in a country where the rivers are considered among the world’s best. King Charles has fished for salmon here, as have David Beckham and Guy Ritchie; Eric Clapton is a regular.
But these, says Jakobsson – known as Gummi, who is the vice-chair of the Blanda and Svartá fishing club – are not wild fish.
CROWDSCIENCE
Which is healthier, farmed or wild salmon?
BBC.com
Released On: 20 October 2023
Salmon are one of the world’s most popular fish. And - in terms of the size of the industry - they’re also the world’s most valuable. They provide crucial proteins and fatty acids to many people’s diets. But like other species of fish, their production is undergoing a historic change. Plenty of salmon is still caught from the wild, but the majority is now farmed off the coasts of countries like Norway or Chile. With global demand on the rise, listener Jodie from Australia wants to know: which is healthier, farmed salmon or wild?
WHY I WON’T BE BUYING SEA-FARMED SALMON EVER AGAIN
I knew there were problems with salmon reared in captivity at sea, but after witnessing the damage inflicted by life in an ocean pen, I will be voting with my shopping trolley, says Graham Lawton
The New Scientist - Graham Lawton
18 October 2023
WE PICKED the wrong day to take a small boat across a fjord in wild western Iceland. The weather was challenging, to say the least, with a heavy swell and lashing rain. We were trying to get out to a salmon farm to see it for ourselves, but were beaten back.
I was in the country on a press trip organised and funded by the outdoor clothing company Patagonia, which campaigns on numerous environmental issues. In this case, it was highlighting the harms of open-net salmon farms, where fish are confined in circular pens in the sea. Iceland is quite new to this, but it is big business in Norway, Scotland, the Faroe Islands and Canada. I knew there were problems associated with it, but continued to eat its bounty from time to time. Never again.
‘CAN WE SAVE THE WILD SALMON OF ICELAND?’: BJORK RELEASES ‘LOST’ SONG TO FISH FARMING
The Icelandic singer discusses her collaboration with Rosalía and how artists pick up on the environmental emergency.
The Guardian - Karen McVeigh
16 October 2023
Iceland’s fish farming industry is “a couple of wild guys who want to make money quick and sacrifice nature”, the Icelandic singer Björk has said before the release of a “lost” song to help fight the increasingly controversial practice.
THE SALMON ON YOUR PLATE HAS A TROUBLING COST. THESE FARMS OFFER HOPE.
Land-based aquaculture is still coming into its own, but it stands to upend an industry plagued by environmental concerns.
The New York Times - Melissa Clark
16 October 2023
A revolution in the way Americans eat salmon is quietly being fomented inside a former factory building on the industrial edges of Auburn, a small city in the Finger Lakes region of New York.
At LocalCoho, one of the country’s few sustainable salmon farms, 50,000 silvery coho salmon glide through concrete tanks filled with freshwater that recirculates through biofilters every half-hour. To mimic a marine environment, the lights are kept a dim, deep aqua blue that makes the salmon seem to glow.
‘WE WON’T SERVE IT’: LEADING UK CHEFS JOIN CAMPAIGN TO CAST FARMED SALMON OFF MENU
Ethical concerns over sustainability and welfare have seen venues offering new choices to ubiquitous ‘chicken of the sea.
The Guardian - Tome Morrissey-Swan
13 October 2023
Salmon has undergone a rapid transformation in recent decades. Once a special treat, it is now ubiquitous. From drinks reception canapés to wedding functions, Christmas smoked salmon or simply wrapped in foil and baked on a week night, salmon is everywhere.
Scotland is world renowned for salmon production, and the fish makes up 40% of its total food exports; it is also Britain’s most valuable food export. Healthy, low in saturated fats and high in omega-3, salmon is a success story.
Yet an increasing number of top chefs are turning their back on the pink-fleshed crowdpleaser – called the “chicken of the sea” by some – citing environmental and welfare issues in salmon farming, including concerns over the use of antibiotics and chemicals; the large amounts of wild fish that could otherwise be eaten by humans being used as feed; its role in declining wild salmon populations; and lack of quality.
THOUSANDS OF HOURS OF FISHING STILL TAKING PLACE IN UK MARINE CONSERVATION ZONES
Fishermen and wildlife groups criticise the lack of enforcement when it comes to protecting these areas and say it's almost too late to save some native sea creatures.
Sky News - Tom Heap
13 August 2023
Protected areas of sea around the UK still endure thousands of hours of the most damaging kinds of fishing every year, Sky News finds.
There are 91 Marine Conservation Zones (MCZs) around Britain which are designated for nationally important, rare or threatened habitats and species.
But data obtained by Global Fishing Watch shows that since January 2022 there has been over 90,000 hours of fishing in these waters, including 2,700 hours of dredging.
BJORK AND ROSALIA TEAM UP TO CAMPAIGN AGAINST INDUSTRIAL FISH FARMING
The Icelandic and Spanish singers create their first collaboration together as Björk alleges large-scale farming has had a ‘devastating effect on wildlife’ in her country
The Guardian - Ben Beaumont-Thomas
6 October 2023
Two of Europe’s most innovative pop singers, Björk and Rosalía, have collaborated on a new song to benefit activists fighting against industrial salmon farming in Björk’s native Iceland.
The song’s title has not been announced, but it will be released later this month; a 75-second preview has been published online.
THOUSANDS OF SALMON ESCAPED AN ICELANDIC FISH FARM. THE IMPACT COULD BE DEADLY.
Aquaculture is bringing jobs and money to rural regions, but a huge escape of farmed fish in August could devastate local salmon populations.
The Guardian - Karen McVeigh
30 September 2023
Clad in black waders, Guðmundur Hauker Jakobsson jumps into the River Blanda, whose freezing waters run down from the Hofsjökull glacier. Armed with a net, he casts around the ascending pools of the river’s fish “ladder”, built to aid wild salmon migrating up this powerful waterway from the sea.
Within minutes, he pulls out a 15lb silver fish, which thrashes and writhes against the net, then another, then another – five in all. The wild salmon of the Blanda here in north-west Iceland are some of the largest and most athletic in a country where the rivers are considered among the world’s best. King Charles has fished for salmon here, as have David Beckham and Guy Ritchie; Eric Clapton is a regular.
But these, says Jakobsson – known as Gummi, who is the vice-chair of the Blanda and Svartá fishing club – are not wild fish.
SWISS LAND-BASED SALMON FARMER SIGNS DEAL WITH TRONDHEIM-BASED TECH PROVIDER
Salmon Business - Editorial Staff
29 August 2023
Land-based producer Swiss Blue Salmon have selected Trondheim-headquartered technology supplier VAQ for its salmon farm in the canton of Glarus, in central Switzerland.
Founded in 2020, Swiss Blue Salmon has secured a 27,000 square meter site to build its 3,400 metric ton land-based recirculating aquaculture systems (RAS) salmon farm.
Vertically integrated from hatchery to grow-out, the facility will have room to expand to produce 12,000 metric tons per annum.
THE PERILS OF FARMING SALMON IN A WARMING WORLD
“A lot of the impacts are not visible until you are in a state of big crisis.”
Mother Jones - Jessica McKenzie
2 July 2023
Comau Fjord is a sliver of sea framed by thickly forested mountain slopes. Melting glaciers peek between the crags. Waterfalls tumble down mountainsides, faint lines across vast expanses of gray rock. It is quintessential Chilean Patagonia, but in the austral summer of 2021, the narrow fjord filled with the smell of putrefying fish.
The salmon farms that populate the remote glacial fjord were in crisis. A massive algal bloom was suffocating salmon in their pens.
Boris Hernandez, a third-generation resident who lives in a house at the edge of the fjord, went out on the water for a closer look. He saw a boat sucking dead fish from one of the salmon farms and spewing pink liquid—a mix of seawater, liquified salmon remains, and algae—out the boat’s other side.
ANIT-SALMON-FARMING ACTIVISTS ARE PLAYING A GLOBAL GAME OF WHACK-A-MOLE
Increasing regulation in several countries is forcing open-net-pen salmon farmers to pack up shop. But then what happens?
Hakai Magazine - Ashley Braun
3 May 2023
When the Canadian government announced in February the closure of 15 controversial Atlantic salmon farms in British Columbia, activists opposed to the open-net-pen farming industry around the world took note. The decision is potentially a preview of the government’s plan, expected in June, that may shutter British Columbia’s remaining open-net-pen operations.
EXPANSION OF SCOTLAND’S SALMON INDUSTRY IN THE CROSSHAIRS AMID ELEVATED FISH MORTALITY FIGURES
A coalition of animal welfare groups and members of Scottish Parliament are calling for Scotland’s salmon farming industry to stop expanding in light of rising salmon mortality numbers.
27 February 2023
According to records published by the Fish Health Inspectorate, the number of fish that died in 2022 was nearly double that of 2021 and triple that of 2020 – reaching nearly 15 million fish between January and November of 2022. The data show that fish mortalities have been rising sharply for several years.
FISHERIES DEPARTMENT TO SHUT 15 SALMON FARMS OFF B.C.'s COASTS TO PROTECT WILD FISH
City News Everywhere - CityNews Staff
18 February 2023
VICTORIA — The plight of British Columbia’s endangered wild salmon came first Friday in the decision against renewing licences for 15 open-net Atlantic salmon farms in the Discovery Islands area off Vancouver Island, says the federal fisheries minister.
Joyce Murray said wild salmon are in serious, long-term decline, with some runs near collapse and the government is making their protection its priority.
The minister said her decision was “difficult,” and she spent the afternoon providing her reasons in phone calls to First Nations and industry officials before making the announcement.