Discovery Islands

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.

Both sides of British Columbia's contentious fish farm debate are welcoming Ottawa's move to delay a decision on a planned transition from open-net salmon farms in the province's coastal waters.

A British Columbia salmon farming company is going to court to challenge the federal government's decision not to renew the licences for its open-net farms off Vancouver Island.

The department is being flooded with calls for change after a parliamentary committee examined how the federal agency conducts, interprets and acts on its own science. 

Minister Joyce Murray says the Discovery Islands area is a key migration route for wild salmon where narrow passages bring migrating juvenile salmon into close contact with the farms.

The summer of 2022 is shaping up to be a bumper season for both pink and sockeye salmon in British Columbia rivers, with one veteran Indigenous fisherman reporting the biggest catches of sockeye in decades.

Coming Tuesday, Aug. 9 on iTunes: The Salmon People builds on the success of CNO’s 2021 debut podcast series, Race Against Climate Change, which earned a nomination for Best Climate Solutions Reporting from the Canadian Journalism Foundation. This new collaborative podcast cements CNO’s commitment to telling impactful and creative stories about the climate.

A formal consultation process for the future of the industry is welcome after years of "ad hoc" discussions over Ottawa's pledge to end open-net salmon aquaculture, the executive director of the B.C. Salmon Farmers Association said on Thursday, June 23, 2022.

The federal government says open-net pen salmon farming may continue off British Columbia's coast outside the Discovery Islands area, while Ottawa undertakes consultation on the plan to transition away from the practice.

Any federal government plans to move away from open-net pen salmon farms in British Columbia should come with transition help for the industry and workers, says Premier John Horgan.

The Connected Coast’s fibre-optic spine to bring rapid internet to coastal communities will snake more than 3,400 kilometres along the coast south from Prince Rupert and Haida Gwaii and around Vancouver Island —– becoming one of the longest coastal subsea networks in the world.

Open-net salmon farm opponents want the new federal fisheries minister to new deny any aquaculture applications to expand production in B.C. waters

The Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) has rejected two recent applications by Cermaq Canada to transfer 1.5 million fish to the company’s Venture Point and Brent Island sites following a decision by Ottawa last year to phase out salmon farms in the Discovery Islands by July 2022.

A virus tied to kidney and liver damage in endangered Chinook salmon is spreading between open-net pen fish farms and wild stocks in B.C., a new study finds.

Homalco Chief Darren Blaney says wild salmon and First Nations will suffer after fish farm companies won a court challenge against a ban on restocking their sites in the Discovery Islands.