aquaculture

Sustainably farmed oysters, mussels and clams are good choices when it comes to climate-friendly seafood, pairing high nutritional value with a low carbon footprint that includes benefits to the marine ecosystem.

The backing of a land-based salmon farm in Japan by a global company with ties to ocean fish farms in British Columbia has Indigenous and conservation groups calling on the federal government to accelerate its transition away from open-net farms.

The Nova Scotia government says no new fish farm applications will be accepted until it completes a campaign promise mapping what areas are best suited for aquaculture. The moratorium doesn’t include a fourfold expansion already proposed by the industry.

Critics and supporters of West Coast fish farms are at odds over a recent Fisheries and Oceans Canada study suggesting sea lice infestations among juvenile wild salmon aren’t strongly tied to aquaculture operations. 

Scientists have long sought to farm the scarce seafood staple, but critics say the animals are not suited to intensive methods.

The ASC, which certifies and labels almost all farmed fish in British Columbia and 45 per cent of the global salmon farming industry, now allows farmers to harvest and sell fish with up to three motile sea lice, which are free-moving, fully grown lice that are able to travel off fish.

Kelly Cove Salmon Ltd. has been running over capacity for the past 18 years, with the province’s knowledge. The company sought to legitimize its operations through the Nova Scotia Aquaculture Review Board with a boundary amendment, applied for in 2016 and granted Jan. 28.

The nasty irony is that shellfish farmers had already been hobbled by COVID-19, which shuttered restaurants and export markets last year.

The Klahoose First Nation is among the first coastal communities to partner with Cascadia Seaweed in an attempt scale up kelp aquaculture along the West Coast. 

New laws are on the horizon for Canada’s aquaculture industry, but environmentalists are wary the proposed legislation might not be enough to protect the country’s oceans.

Researcher Thierry Chopin has been pitching the ecological, economic and social benefits of farming seaweed and salmon together since the late 1990s. But, there won't be adoption of co-cultivation in salmon farming until there is regulatory change and financial incentive, he says.

Fisheries Minister Bernadette Jordan says Canada can get more out of its marine resources through a strategy that also protects ocean health.

Like most salmon scientists, Andrea Reid spends months each year searching for the iconic fish in salty estuaries and along the silty riverbanks of B.C.’s glacial torrents.

Many science, industry and investment stakeholders support seaweed aquaculture as a potential means to grow a sustainable super food that benefits the economy and environment.

Cermaq Canada has stocked close to half a million Atlantic salmon smolts into a new semi-closed containment system (SCCS) in Millar Channel on the west coast of Vancouver Island.