Oceans Update - June 2025

The main migration route for Fraser River and other South Coast salmon was largely cleared of salmon farms by 2020. A few still operate at the north end of Vancouver Island and there’s a problematic cluster of 3 at the entrance to the Broughton, but by and large, the route has been cleaned up. So what’s been the result for wild fish? 

Let’s be clear up front: it’s too soon to say whether or not the removal of salmon farms is responsible for what I’m about to tell you. Lots of factors influence salmon returns—ocean conditions, habitat conditions, climate and more. And since the impacts of salmon farms on wild salmon have not been fully studied, it isn’t even certain what number of threats vanished or decreased with farm removal. 

But the news is good! 

There are several ways of looking at recent years’ salmon returns. You can compare the actual numbers to what DFO predicted for that year or you can compare the returns to the number in the parent (brood year) generation. Or, you can compare returns to an average taken over a relevant period—say 3-4 generations of any particular species of salmon. We chose the latter approach for our new mapping project, because it provides a longer-term view of the trends in a salmon population. Our new interactive maps [link] show which rivers are seeing improvement and which are static or declining. 

The Fraser River has so many discrete populations that it’s worth taking a closer look at recent returns versus brood year returns. Alex Morton culled the numbers on Fraser sockeye and made the graph below. 

Scientists at DFO and elsewhere have been saying for a decade or more that early marine survival of salmon has been poor and they attribute declining populations to this.  

Clearly, early marine survival for these fish in 2024 was not a problem! Farms had been removed from the Discovery Islands and the Broughton in the year prior to their outmigration. This shows the potential for Fraser sockeye to rebuild, despite high water temperatures in the river, landslides and other habitat degradation. 

Scientists may never agree on the relationship between farm removal and salmon returns, but the First Nations of the Broughton see it pretty clearly. They identified the impacts to their fish from the farms and systematically closed them. The results for pink salmon in local rivers have been astounding---mind you, returns were good in many other places as well, so clearly there were some favourable ocean conditions at work, too. But you’ll never convince former Chief Don Svanvik that there’s no link between farm removal and increased returns, when the pinks are coming back orders of magnitude stronger. 

Compelling science now links both farm-bred disease agents and sea lice with poor salmon returns and/or poor body condition in the outmigrating smolts. It’s time for a Transition Plan that fulfills the longstanding Liberal government promise to remove open-net pens from BC waters. We await the Plan, said to be completed and itself awaiting a budget allocation. We expect it to finally realize the potential to restore the wild salmon economy and the wild salmon ecosystem for the benefit of all. 

Photo credit: Tavish Campbell 

Guest op-ed by Dr Gideon Mordecai 
Research Associate 
Institute for the Oceans and Fisheries 
University of British Columbia 

Considering the multitude of stressors they face, for Pacific salmon populations to have any chance at recovery, the Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) must rely on the best available evidence to inform decisions related to their management. 

As an independent scientist investigating the diversity of pathogens that infect salmon, I’ve witnessed first hand the gross inaccuracy of government science advice when it comes to the disease risks posed by open-net pen salmon farming.  

The pathogens which have the largest impact on wild salmon are those associated with salmon farming, and unfortunately DFO are infamous for not following the evidence related to the aquaculture related disease risks posed to wild salmon. While these diseases pose a continual threat to wild salmon health and survival, government science outputs bow to industry pressure, ignoring or suppressing inconvenient evidence to underreport the actual risk posed. 

Scientists (including the government's own scientists) have repeatedly highlighted the potential risk posed to wild salmon as a result of disease transmission from open-net salmon farms, but DFO repeatedly finds a way to deny, downplay or suppress the evidence. As a result, DFO’s conclusions routinely contradict the broader body of international, peer-reviewed science.  

For example, DFO science advice concluded that the presence of parasitic sea lice on wild juvenile salmon is not associated with sea lice from nearby salmon farms. A plethora of peer-reviewed research finds the opposite. DFO’s disease agent assessment for Piscine orthoreovirus concludes that the lineage of in BC is not an ‘infectious disease agent’ (despite the evidence linking this virus with disease on farms and in wild fish), and that the bacterial pathogen Tenacibaculum is not “likely to cause disease…in wild fish populations” (despite mounting evidence finding the opposite). None of these claims hold up to scientific scrutiny, and the scientific literature concludes the opposite (reviewed here).  

As a researcher external to these processes, I am continually dismayed that the official government science advice is so far off the mark when it comes to key issues which influence the health of wild salmon populations, especially as wild salmon are such a fundamental part of coastal ecosystems, Indigenous culture and way of life, and economic livelihoods. 

How did we end up in a situation where official government science advice diverges so significantly from the current scientific consensus? Industry capture of DFO science review processes has been well documented; key documents can be authored by industry associated scientists and aquaculture-focused DFO staff whose role is to  “support aquaculture development”. The result is government science advice that does not stand up to scientific standards, and no clear pathway for external independent scientists to weigh in. This is particularly urgent in the context of Canada’s planned transition away from open-net pen aquaculture in British Columbia. If this transition is to succeed in safeguarding wild salmon, it must be rooted in the best available science, not politically convenient narratives. While social and economic considerations rightfully play a role in the decision making process, these must be insulated from the science advice on these issues, not an influence on the science outcome itself. 

As other threats, such as climate change, intensify beyond immediate control, the case for ensuring decision makers are adequately informed and able to act on the evidence on this preventable risk is stronger than ever. 

The Solution? To give wild salmon populations a chance at recovery, DFO must adhere to its own policy on science integrity. Government documents purportedly based on science (such as DFO’s disease agent assessment forms) must be made publicly available, scientific reports need to be independently reviewed, and data sets should be made public. Ultimately, these will serve to ensure the quality of DFO’s science outputs. Science is one of the strongest tools we have for informed decision-making, but to be credible and effective it needs to be implemented with transparency, open data, and the opportunity for external validation.  

For these reasons, myself and colleagues have been advocating for Canada to establish an independent fisheries science advisory body, free from political and industry influence. This new body could deliver credible science advice to inform what are often contentious decisions on managing Canada’s fisheries. Science is just one component of policy-making, but it's a critical one. Too often, groups with vested interests claim to be ‘following the science’ while failing to adhere to its key scientific principles. 

To protect and recover wild salmon populations, robust evidence is needed to inform a path forward. But to serve this role, science needs integrity, transparency, and the support that allows it to remain science in practice, not just in name. 

Photo credit Tavish Campbell.

Homiskanis (Don Svanvik)
Alexandra Morton

Summary
In 2023, the Canadian Scientific Advisory Secretariat (CSAS), Canada’s highest science authority, reported that salmon farms do not elevate sea lice infections on wild salmon. This finding opposite to research published over several decades by Canada’s leading universities raised questions.
Internal DFO documents reveal a draft of this CSAS Sea Lice Report had been altered inexplicably reversing the original result that salmon farms do increase lice on wild salmon.
Your government’s upcoming 2029 ban on open net salmon farming in BC hinges on whether the industry causes less than minimal impact on wild salmon, including transmission of farm lice infection. Sea lice are an intractable global problem harming both salmon farm profits and the wild salmon exposed to salmon farms.
It took two years and a direct order from the Information Commissioner of Canada to force DFO to release the data used in CSAS Sea Lice Report. As soon as these data were made public, DFO authors of the CSAS Sea Lice Report reversed their conclusions in an abstract posted May 8, 2025, on a scientific journal website. Using the same data, these authors reverting to the original result that sea lice on salmon do increase sea lice infection of wild salmon, opposite to the Science Advisory Secretariate’s declaration.
Cermaq entered this CSAS Sea Lice Report as evidence against Canada and our Fisheries Ministers, in a Civil Claim for losses due to closure of salmon farms. We now understand that the authors no long stand by its conclusions, since the report’s data were made public.

Brief Outline
The Canadian Science Advisory Secretariat (CSAS) Sea Lice report, completed in 2022, released in 2023, cleared salmon farmers of responsibility for sea lice outbreaks that are harmful to young wild salmon. The list of authors includes DFO scientists Jewoon Jeong, Dr. Simon Jones, Dr. Stewart Johnson and Jay Parsons.
Internal DFO documents show Dr. Simon Jones altered a draft of the CSAS Sea Lice Report provided to him by Jeong. Jeong’s analysis states salmon farms are implicated in lice infection of wild salmon. Without explanation Dr. Simon Jones, senior DFO scientist, struck out portions of this manuscript and added text in a WORD document which recorded his initials on his edits. These edits reversed the conclusions so that the document now reported salmon farms are not responsible for sea lice outbreaks on wild
salmon. The intent of this edit carried over into the final version posted on the Canadian Science Advisory Secretariat website.
Independent scientists with decades of experience studying the relationship between salmon farms and sea lice infestations on young BC wild salmon, were not convinced and requested the CSAS Sea Lice Report data for reanalysis. DFO refused provide this data until, after a two-year effort, the Information Commissioner of Canada found the reasons to withhold invalid and ordered the Minister of Fisheries to release this data.
Shortly after the data was released, Jeong, Jones, Johnson and Parsons, authors on the CSAS Sea Lice Report, appear on an abstract posted on a scientific journal website where they use the same data to conclude that indeed sea lice from salmon farms do infect wild salmon.
The Sea Lice Report posted on the Canadian Scientific Advisory Secretariat website and the scientific paper by the same authors, using the same data, cannot both be true.

Details
2023 DFO released the Canadian Science Advisory Secretariat (CSAS) Sea Lice Report which stated there is “No statistically significant association” between sea lice on farm salmon and sea lice on young wild salmon swimming past the farms. Jeawoon Jeong, Simon Jones, Stewart Johnson and Jay Parsons are listed among the authors.
January 30, 2023, Sixteen non-government scientists highly qualified in this field deemed these results unsubstantiated and sent a critique of the CSAS Sea Lice Report to the Minister of Fisheries listing serious ethical and technical concerns. They went on to request the data used by DFO to allow open and transparent confirmation of the outlier conclusion. Open access data is a modern standard of science. Among the scientists’ concerns was omission of key data that altered the final result, a red flag of potential scientific fraud. DFO refused to provide the data.
Internal DFO documents accessed by Alexandra Morton appear to show Dr. Simon Jones, senior DFO parasitologist, identified by his initials in a WORD doc altering a draft of the Sea Lice Report provided to him by his assistant, Jeong. Jeong’s words that farm lice do influence infection on wild salmon were struck out and replaced, without explanation, that sea lice infection of wild salmon could not be explained by lice in salmon farms. (See page 5, comment “JS” Jones, Simon).
This perversion of the original result carried over into the Canadian Science Advisory Secretariat Sea Lice Report which states ”No statistically significant association was observed between” farm lice and wild infections (See page 23).
The salmon farming industry promoted this Canadian Science Advisory Secretariate CSAS Sea Lice Report as confirmation their industry was not impacting wild salmon with lice infections. Mowi and Cermaq used it in their judicial review against the Fisheries Minister’s decision to protect wild salmon by closing 17 salmon farms in the Discovery Islands, Canada’s biggest wild salmon migration corridori and Cermaq cites the CSAS Sea Lice Report as evidence in their civil claim for losses against Canada’s Ministers of Fisheries for closing salmon farms:

27. “In January 2023, CSAS released Science Response 2022/045 concluding that there was no statistical correlation between the presence of Atlantic salmon farms and sea lice counts on wild juvenile Pacific salmonii”.

February 16, 2023, Stan Proboszcz, Watershed Watch, filed an access to information request for the data used by the CSAS Sea Lice Report.
June 2, 2023, Proboszcz received material from DFO in response to his request (A-2022-01091), but the CSAS Sea Lice data had been redacted.
May 30, 2024, a year later, Dr. Andrew Bateman, Pacific Salmon Foundation, one of the 16 scientists who critiqued the CSAS Sea Lice Report, received incomplete files from David Morin Director General, Ocean and Regulatory Science, with the pertinent data omitted.
Proboszcz filed an Environmental Petition to the Auditor General of Canada and on January 28, 2025, commissioner Caroline Maynard “ordered the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans [Diane Lebouthillier] to fully disclose the records.”
April 2025, during the election, the CSAS Sea Lice Report data was finally released.
May 8, 2025, within weeks of release of the data in an inexplicable twist, Jeong, Jones, Johnson and Parsons, appear as coauthors on a scientific paper stating the opposite of their CSAS Sea Lice Report. They revert to Jeong’s original result, before Dr. Jones added his edits, that salmon farm lice do increase lice infections on young wild salmon.
By this time, the Strathcona Regional District board had voted to support salmon farms citing the CSAS Sea Lice Report as evidence that salmon farms in the Discovery Islands were not harming wild salmon. And this CSAS report from Canada’s highest science authority was entered into evidence in lawsuit by the salmon farming industry against Canada.
May 2025 the Government of Canada continues to display the CSAS Sea Lice Report as scientific advice that salmon farms are not harming wild salmon with sea lice infection, while the DFO authors of this report now claim the opposite.
We respectfully submit a list of potential actions in response to this information:

1. Immediately remove the CSAS Sea Lice Report from the Government of Canada website.
2. Inform Government of Canada lawyers working to defend Canada against the Civil Claim that the authors of the CSAS Sea Lice Report no longer stand by their 2022 results.
3. Require from this time forward that the Canadian Scientific Advisory Secretariate release all underlying data used in their scientific advice to repair trust in Canadian government science.
4. Examine the current CSAS Sea Lice do over which is underway to ensure it does better than the 2022 process by interviewing the non-government scientists involved to record their evaluation of the hope that the outcome will not be a repeat of the current disarray.
5. Fully evaluate the state of wild salmon returns in all regions of British Columbia with special attention to wild salmon survival rates where salmon farms have been removed vs. where they still operate, sharing data with non-government scientists to ensure balance.
6. Review the actions of the scientists involved through the lens of potential Scientific Fraud; a recognized trend since the tobacco industry dangerous to society and could be discouraged through mandatory requirements for transparency.

i We Wai Kai and Wei Wai Kum First Nations, MOWI Canada West Inc., Cermaq Canada LTD., and Grieg Seafood BC vs The Minister of Fisheries - Diane Morrison Affidavit, paras 101-102, Peter McKenzie Affidavit, para 26
ii Cermaq Civil Claim against Minister of Fisheries para 27, Court File No. VLC-S-S-251228, Feb 18, 2025

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Plans are all set for a June expedition to remove marine debris, this time from the easterly portion of Cape Scott Provincial Park’s North Coast Trail. Three field teams will tackle Laura Creek, Shuttleworth Bight and Skinner Creek regions. We’ve been to Laura Creek previously, but the other two areas are new for us although frequently reported to be badly impacted by plastic debris. 

We’ve never been able to mount three separate teams before. Two factors enable us to do it this time: first, the amazing support of the Blue Friday corporate donors. Together, they raised nearly $30,000 to support our work. (This effort will cost about twice that amount, but you, our steadfast supporters, have always given generously to support this program.) 

The second factor enabling us to mount multiple crews is the dedication and skill of our volunteers.  Some have been with us for a decade now. A special call-out to Living Oceans Director and volunteer Eric Grantner, our longest-standing volunteer, for agreeing to lead Team 1 and to David Jensen, arguably the most highly-skilled of our volunteers in wilderness survival and debris extraction, for agreeing to lead Team 2.  Executive Director Karen Wristen leads the third team. Each will have a mix of new and experienced volunteers. 

After last year’s monumental efforts yielded over 60 tonnes of debris, we’re not sure what we’ll find. One thing that’s certain is that winter storms will have redistributed every piece of plastic that remained in the inaccessible, rocky coves of the region, hopefully bringing much of it within reach. 

Last month, we rallied conservation groups from every major salmon region around the world to call out the Aquaculture Stewardship Council certification’s newly released Farm Standard for continuing to endorse irresponsible open net pen salmon farming practices that place wild salmon and our oceans at risk.  

Despite being termed ‘new’ the Farm Standard adopts much of the old Salmon Standard criteria that has been weakened over the last decade to accommodate industry norms. In turn, this has allowed around 32% of global farmed salmon production to become ASC certified.  

Living Oceans and our SeaChoice allies have been watchdogging the ASC since the very beginning. Twenty years ago, we participated in the Salmon Aquaculture Dialogues to push the bar, helping to establish Salmon Standard’s strict sea lice that went far beyond mere legal requirements. Once the ASC took over the Salmon Standard, and it became apparent that industry was unable to meet these conditions, the ASC quickly began lowering the bar. For example, the number of sea lice allowed on ASC certified B.C. farms increased by up to 1,550 per cent. 

But it’s not just sea lice. The number of allowable chemical treatments has risen by up to 350 per cent in some regions. Meanwhile, antibiotics treatments are high with six treatments allowed per production cycle, despite the ever growing threat of antimicrobial resistance. The amount of wild fish (1.2 kg fish meal; 2.52 kg fish oil) allowed greatly outweighs what it takes to produce 1 kg of farmed fish. Concerningly, exceptions for salmon farms in protected areas also continue.  

Consumers and retailers alike should not trust the ASC ‘responsibly sourced’ label on farmed salmon. Nor should they trust competition certifications, the Global Seafood Alliance’s Best Aquaculture Practices (BAP) or GLOBALG.A.P., which have also been criticized by the conservation groups for weak standards and greenwashing. 

Living Oceans is again proud to be adding our support and expertise to the groundbreaking shareholder activism campaign, Save the Skate.   

In case you missed it, last year the Save the Skate campaign rallied over a 100 shareholders in each of Australia’s major retailers, Woolworths Group and Coles Group (who also happen to be some of the world’s largest retailers), to submit the first-of-its-kind resolution calling for them to report and disclose the impact their farmed seafood has on endangered species – including the Maugean skate which is at risk of extinction due to salmon farms in its only home, Macquarie Harbour, Tasmania.   

The voting results were historically significant. Nearly 40 per cent (39.11%) voted in favour against the Coles board’s recommendation. A large vote was also achieved with Woolworths (30.42%). Of the 550 plus shareholder resolutions put forward in 2024, the Coles vote was the largest in the world for a nature-risk resolution. Importantly, the voting included several international and national pension funds representing millions of members – sending a strong message to the companies’ boards.   

While Coles has stated they have begun reducing their salmon sourcing from the area impacting the endangered Maugean skate; and Woolworths pledged greater transparency on their salmon sourcing – both continue to sell Macquarie Harbour salmon.   

That’s why, last month, the campaign resubmitted a shareholder resolution to Woolworths. Plans are to also resubmit to Coles. Shareholder activism campaigns often build in support from year to year, as more and more funds representing millions get on board, as investor expectations grow for corporations to address human rights, nature, and climate risks within their supply chains.      

Living Oceans has been providing our expertise to the campaign with our SeaChoice work on retailer sustainable seafood procurement policies, farmed salmon certifications, and responsible business practice due diligence. You can read more about how the shareholder campaign connects to our SeaChoice work – and why Canadian companies should also take notice.