Oceans Update September 2024

Can kicked even farther down the road 

Any time the government releases something late on a Friday afternoon, we prepare for disappointment. The draft Salmon Aquaculture Transition Plan, finally released on the afternoon of September 20, lived up to expectations in that regard. Simply put, it’s long on good intentions, long on timelines and very, very short on deliverables for the protection of wild salmon. 

On the positive side, we are pleased to see a whole-of-government response to transition planning that will be led, not by the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, but by the Ministry of Innovation, Science and Industry. This was a key recommendation put forward by Living Oceans and colleagues during the years of consultation that preceded this draft. 

Also positive: collaboration with Provincial, local and First Nations governments is stressed throughout. A customized approach that deals individually with each of the few First Nations communities that currently derive benefits from the salmon aquaculture industry also sounds good—provided those communities can come together to make the views of the majority of their members known; and provided that the rights of all Nations that depend on wild salmon throughout the Province are also accommodated. 

Of more concern is the language throughout the Plan that speaks to B.C. becoming a ‘world leader in sustainable salmon aquaculture’ through the adoption of new, clean technology. This is concerning because there isn’t any new, clean technology that protects wild salmon from salmon farm sewage, pathogens and parasites. The Plan references ocean-based “closed containment” salmon farms—newspeak for semi-closed systems that continue to pollute and require open-net pens to grow salmon to market size. The door has been left wide open for industry to continue to impact wild salmon ecosystems; and worse, to do it with taxpayer supports for investment in whatever ‘new technology’ they might choose. 

With industry already protesting that it is impossible to transition by 2029, when the government proposes to ban open-net pens, this Plan envisages a decade-plus timeline for supporting community economic development. Some of that support may go to enterprises other than salmon farming, if First Nations or other communities ask for it; but the focus of the Plan is clearly on promoting salmon aquaculture. It’s not hard to see this can being kicked even farther down the road. 

And for wild salmon? Two more years of management under the wholly inadequate Conditions of Licence announced in June, before those Conditions will be reviewed in 2026. 

The promise to enshrine the 2029 ban in regulation will take 18 to 24 months to accomplish, according to the Task Force appointed to oversee the Transition. We may well be going into the next federal election with nothing actually accomplished beyond an assurance that a Liberal government will, in 2029, if they’re still around to do it, ban open-net pens salmon farms. 

Living Oceans joined global efforts calling for the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) to revise their position on sustainable aquaculture to exclude carnivorous fish farming, including salmon. We also joined an open letter to the Norwegian Government urging them to mandate a ban on sourcing fish oil from Northwest Africa.  

Today, just over half (51%) of global seafood comes from aquaculture. For over the last decade, farmed salmon has retained the number one spot, globally, for the most valuable traded aquaculture species. The rise of the profitable farmed salmon comes with a high price tag for our wild fish, oceans -- and the many communities that rely on them.  

In 2022, approximately 22 per cent of the global fish catch (more than 17 million tonnes) was used to feed carnivorous fish such as farmed salmon. Increasing demand and profits not only drains our oceans of wild fish to feed unsustainable salmon; it also fuels food insecurity in areas such as West Africa where industrial fleets plunder marine waters for fish feed for Norwegian farmed salmon.  

Despite the evidence, time and time again the farmed salmon industry claims ‘sustainability’ and ‘feeding the world’. These claims are reflected in government and FAO policies. It’s time for governments and the FAO to face the reality that farming salmon does not meet these claims. Instead, these agencies should implement policies that support true environmental and socially responsible growth in non-carnivorous aquaculture (e.g., shellfish, seaweed, herbivorous fish) and small-scale fisheries.  Add your voice: Sign the petition to the FAO here. 

It’s truly amazing what we can accomplish with teamwork and adequate funding. We don’t have the final numbers on this year’s marine debris cleanup yet and won’t have for some time, but it would appear that Living Oceans and partners brought in nearly 40 tonnes of plastic marine debris this year—much of it from the Scott Islands, a hotspot of biodiversity and therefore also of risk for plastic entanglement and consumption. 

Partnering with Quatsino and Tlatlasikwala First Nations, Lonepaddle Conservationists Society and Rugged Coast Research Society, we applied to the Province’s Clean Coast, Clean Waters Initiative Fund with a project focused on the Scott Islands, but also including the Cape Scott Trail and the northwest coast’s water-access-only beaches that we’ve cleaned for the past 10 years.  

The difference we’ve made with that decade of work (funded by all of you, thank you very much!) was starkly apparent: on the beaches we clean annually, we picked up between 2-4 of cubic metres of debris. On Lanz Island, which has never been cleaned before, Rugged Coast filled 240 supersacks (about 1.5 cubic metres apiece). Cox Island, which we’ve cleaned in day-trips a few times over the years, yielded about 150 cubic metres plus 25 barrels, 50 large floats, 3 large pallets and a couple of dozen tires. 

There were some impressive moments on this trip, but the one that I’ll never forget is the sight of the team working together on Cox Island to roll a massive bundle of hawser and heavy electrical cable out of a streambed. It had to weigh at least 700 lb, soaking wet and full of mud. The hawser alone was so large and heavy that to bag it, we had to cut it into pieces and leave it in the sun to dry before lifting it into several lift bags. Everyone was covered in mud, soaked and elated! 

Picking up the debris and bagging it was challenging enough, but transporting it to landfill/recycling was fraught. We realized early in the Lanz cleanup that there was far too much debris to take out by helicopter alone—we needed a barge. We organized helicopters, tug, barge and trucking for September 8-9, only to find the weather closing in before we’d lifted a quarter of the debris.  

The whole operation had to be reorganized for September 14-15, with the threat of a major storm on the horizon. We booked three helicopters, determined to get the job done. The night before it was all to happen, we found ourselves 2 helicopters down: one pilot concerned about weather and one machine with mechanical issues. Our hats are off to pilot Wylie at Kestrel Helicopters, whose impressive longlining skills and efficiency enabled him to load the remaining 300-odd bags, all while moving our ground crew about from cache to cache! 

David Jensen (Lonepaddle) worked with us throughout the season, right through until the last bag was sorted, weighed and left at the marine debris recycling depot. His paddleboard expertise allowed him to access beaches that we can’t get to by boat. He single-handedly cleaned the pocket beaches from Cape Russell to Cape Scott, as well as several more on Cox Island. 

To ensure equitable market access for small-scale fisheries and raise sustainability standards across certification schemes, Living Oceans, SeaChoice and others advocated for a review of the long-outdated FAO Guidelines for Seafood Ecolabelling during the recent Committee on Fisheries 36th session in Rome.  

The FAO Guidelines sets the basic requirements and practices expected for fishery eco-certifications. Prominent certifications such as the Marine Stewardship Council claim adherence to the guidelines. Updating the guidelines provides the opportunity to drive change at the MSC and other schemes that continue to certify questionable and unsustainable practices, as well as preferentially support industrial fleets over small-scale fisheries.  

Good news: the FAO Committee on Fisheries accepted our request! 

Image COFI36 credit: Kate O’Connell.

Our annual photo contest is open! Submit your photos by September 30, 2024 for the chance to win a prize!  

This event has been held by Living Oceans Society for over 20 years. This is a chance to champion ocean protection and educate the public on why ocean health is important. 

Support a healthy ocean, get out into nature, find out more about the creatures around you, understand the challenges to ocean health and fall in love with the environment. Together we can protect and showcase the amazing beauty of nature. 

Help us highlight the ocean and support the protection of this important resource. Be ready to share your best photos. Submissions will be accepted until September 30, 2024 

In the meantime, get inspired by the 2023 winners’ photos here. 

Check out our photo contest page for more details: https://livingoceans.org/action/ocean-exposures-photo-contest-2024 

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A global first shareholder activism campaign targeting major Australian supermarkets has rallied more than 120 shareholders to back a resolution calling for the removal of farmed salmon to save the endangered Maugean skate.  

Living Oceans is a proud partner of the Save the Skate shareholder activism campaign, providing expertise from our SeaChoice work of watchdogging retailer sustainable seafood policies and certifications. 

The campaign is a global first on many fronts: the first to specifically target farmed salmon; first to challenge flawed supermarket sustainability policies and their reliance on greenwashing certifications; and the first aimed at halting an extinction emergency.   

The millennia-old skate is on the trajectory to be uplisted to critically endangered with only an estimated 40-120 adult skates left in the wild. Conservation Advice to the Australian Government has identified salmon farming as a “catastrophic” threat to the skate’s survival.  

Worldwide, including Canada, there is an increasing investor expectation that companies disclose and plan for how to respond to nature-based risks in their supply chains. For example, the World Economic Forum ranked biodiversity loss as the third-largest global severe risk over the next decade. 

Supermarket shareholders of Woolworths and Coles are due to vote on saving the skate in the coming months at their annual general meetings. We’re keeping a close eye on what happens next with the ground-breaking Save the Skate campaign in anticipation that similar shareholder initiative could be established in Canada. 

Canada signed the High Seas Treaty on March 4, 2024, but now we need to see more urgency! The historic Treaty requires ratification by 60 countries to make it law and protect marine biodiversity.  We’re nowhere near that yet. 

Canada must act now. The delay by Canada to ratify the Treaty sends a message that swims against being an environmental leader.  The longer Canada waits, the less influence it will wield to shape ocean issues.  As a country surrounded by oceans, this seems short sighted. 

Protecting the High Seas is an essential step in implementing the Global Biodiversity Framework, which sees 30 per cent of land and ocean protected by 2030. Canada’s ratification of the Treaty will signal our commitment to the protection of our oceans and marine biodiversity. 

Let Canada’s leadership know you want the Treaty ratified. Use #HighSeasTreaty #RaceForRatification and tag Minister Lebouthillier and Prime Minister Trudeau in your social media posts. 

You can follow which countries have signed and ratified the agreement here: https://highseasalliance.org/treaty-ratification/table-of-countries

• The OceanChange Partnership (OCP) Report  

OCP has wrapped up their eight-year research project into Canada’s oceans, which was conducted in collaboration with Fisheries and Oceans Canada, among other partners. The results of their research were recently published in Sea Change: Charting a Sustainable Future for Oceans in Canada, from UBC Press. 

• Outlaw Ocean Podcast

The Outlaw Ocean Podcast is a seven-part series. It explores the shadowy side of criminality and exploitation in the world’s oceans. The podcast brings all of The Outlaw Ocean Project's journalism together as an immersive podcast series. 

• The Marine Detective

Jackie Hildering is a biology teacher, cold-water diver, underwater photographer, and Humpback Whale researcher living and learning in the Territories of the Kwakwala-speaking Peoples, northeast Vancouver Island, BC. She is a whale researcher and co-founder of the Marine Education and Research Society. We love to follow her adventures on social media and scour her website for exciting new information.