A spokesperson for the federal fisheries department says a plan to transition B.C. salmon production to land-based farms 'will come in due course.'DARRYL DYCK/The Canadian Press
The federal government’s reported plan to transition B.C. salmon production to land-based farms has elicited skepticism regarding its timeline and costs.
Citing three unnamed sources, The Globe and Mail reported Monday that the Liberal government plans to push forward on a 2019 campaign commitment to put an end to open-net salmon fish farms in coastal B.C. waters. The industry will be afforded five years to adapt; further details were not available at press time.
Salmon are farmed mainly in net pens in the ocean. Recirculating aquaculture systems (RAS), also known as land-based or closed-containment farming, involves raising them in tanks inside buildings. Water is initially filtered or treated with ultraviolet light to eliminate contamination, and recirculated continuously, its quality tightly controlled to optimize growth rates and health of the fish.
RAS has long been used to raise other species, and salmon growers in British Columbia already employ it to grow larger salmon before transferring them to the ocean. In the past decade or so, however, it’s been successfully used to grow market-sized salmon. Its development has been fuelled by rising demand for salmon worldwide, even as production growth stalled because of environmental problems associated with sea-based aquaculture – including outbreaks of sea lice and disease in Norway and Chile, the two largest producers.
Currently, there’s one land-based salmon farming operation in B.C.: Kuterra, started in 2013 by the Namgis First Nation near Port McNeill on Vancouver Island. Launched as a pilot project, Kuterra in 2019 signed a 15-year lease agreement with Emergent Holdings, a parent company of Whole Oceans, which has for several years been developing a project in Maine.
Before the lease agreement was reached, Emergent had offered to buy a majority stake in Kuterra, saying in a 2019 press release that “Kuterra has shown that land-based RAS Atlantic salmon farming is environmentally safe and economically sound at scale.”
A 2019 assessment produced by Gardner Pinfold Consultants Inc. for the federal fisheries department found that capital costs for RAS plants had fallen significantly over the preceding decade, and concluded the technology was “ready for commercial application in B.C.” Key environmental benefits included eliminating the risk of escaped fish or spreading diseases to wild salmon. However, water use by very large RAS facilities could stoke local opposition, particularly if that water is extracted from aquifers.
A 2022 study prepared for the B.C. government by Counterpoint Consulting, an economic analysis company, cautioned that there were no RAS salmon farms worldwide that had achieved a steady production of 3,000 tonnes or greater, making cost estimation difficult. But it found that a medium-sized farm would require a capital investment of $1.8-billion. And it would take at least a decade for RAS producers in B.C. to get the necessary permits, build plants and achieve steady operations.
Edwin Blewett, the report’s lead author, added that RAS is technically challenging.
“It’s kind of like you have a million balls up in the air,” he said. “You’ve got the temperature of the water, you’ve got how much oxygen is in the water – you’ve got variable after variable after variable.”
Operational challenges have plagued several land-based salmon farms. Atlantic Sapphire, a Florida-based startup, suffered mass mortalities at its Miami-based RAS plant in 2020 and 2021. Sustainable Fish Farming (Canada) Ltd. suffered a catastrophe in November at its land-based salmon farm in Hants County, N.S. According to an application in March to place the company and associated entities into receivership, a crucial piece of equipment failed, resulting in the deaths of 96,000 salmon – wiping out its entire planned harvest between November and July.
The BC Salmon Farmers Association criticized the reported federal plan, which it said would lead to rising food prices and heightened food insecurity throughout North America.
“The idea that 70,000 tonnes of BC salmon can be produced on land in five years is unrealistic and ignores the current capabilities of modern salmon farming technology, as it has not been done successfully to scale anywhere in the world,” executive director Brian Kingzett said in a written statement.
Kathryn Hallett, a spokesperson for the federal fisheries department, wrote in an e-mailed response to questions that “an announcement on a transition plan will come in due course.”
Dallas Smith is a spokesperson for the Coalition of First Nations for Finfish Stewardship, a group representing several coastal First Nations in B.C. that want to maintain or expand existing salmon farming operations.
Land-based operations are not feasible for many communities in the coalition, Mr. Smith said, citing constraints including challenging terrain, distance to commercial markets and lack of reliable, affordable electricity.
“Specifically, in our territories, we don’t have the flat land base and we don’t have the power,” Mr. Smith said.
He added that a transition plan should include funds for research and new infrastructure, including potential processing facilities for salmon and other ocean products, such as shellfish, that could provide year-round employment.
“There’s over 500 full-time jobs in First Nations communities related to this sector. Simply saying that these jobs are gone in five years, without any meaningful transition in place to fill those gaps, is just going to be disastrous.”
Canada is among the world’s largest producers of farmed salmon. However, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization’s most recent review of international fisheries markets noted that among the major producers, Canada has suffered “the greatest difficulties” because of ocean farm closings in B.C.’s key producing areas. It added: “The declining salmon production trend in Canada is forecast to continue.”