Transcript – Aquaculture, Farming The Seas

---

Narrator: It's harvest time at Swanson Island, British Columbia where Stolt Sea Farms raises premium quality salmon for the international seafood market. Keeping up with the world's demand for seafood is a tough job. We consume it by the tonne: 100 million tonnes per year to be exact. And by the year 2000, our global annual seafood consumption is expected to reach 120 million tonnes. That's a tall order to fill. And though we've always considered the ocean's supply to be limitless, we're beginning to realize that Mother Nature is having a hard time keeping up. As fishing seasons grow shorter, the market is depending more and more on markets like this one for fresh seafood.

Video title: Aquaculture, Farming the Seas

Narrator: Aquaculture is the farming of aquatic organisms including fish, shellfish and aquatic plants. Little more than a hobby 15 years ago, today the industry in Canada is worth more than $300 million and it is capable of doubling in size over the coming decade. Aquaculture is a major supplier of salmon, trout, oysters, mussels and clams. And it's an industry that has set down roots in every province in Canada.

Bob Love, Senior Manager, Stolt Sea Farms: This is a farm, and like any other farm, it's not a job, it's a way of life. And I love what I'm doing. I love working on the water and I love working with the fish that are in our pens here.

Narrator: Techniques for delivering fish to market are expanding from baiting hook and net to include sophisticated cultivation and as with any other type of food cultivation, the farmer has a large degree of control over the quality of the product.

Two and a half years ago, these salmon started out as eggs in a hatchery like this one, owned by Connors Brothers Ltd. For the first, year, they remain in freshwater and are fed a nutritionally balanced diet to ensure optimal health and growth. Within a year, they become smolts and are ready to be transferred into ocean cages where they'll be fed and fared for for another 12 to 18 months. These salmon are now ready to be harvested and processed for the highly competitive international salmon market.

Bob Love: When they get to the processing plant, they've got several people that handle the fish. Our fish, they're very well handled. They're babied on my site(?). We baby these fish. It's not just my responsibility. It's everybody's responsibility that works for me to ensure that these fish are the highest quality fish that go to any market, B.C., Canada, United States, Japan, all over the world.

Narrator: Farm-raised salmon is the largest agrifood export product produced in both British Columbia and New Brunswick. This processing plant was built in Campbell River, British Columbia, specifically to receive and process farmed salmon.

Greg D'Avignon, Executive Director, B.C. Salmon Farmers Association: Campbell River is a perfect example of the potential that salmon farming holds for coastal communities. In Campbell River last year, over 400 people were employed directly or indirectly in salmon farming. That contributed about $12.2 million to the local economy just in wages and benefits alone. If you take into account all the surplus spending that took place, that figure is over $30 million, a significant contribution to a coastal community.

Narrator: Because it's a relatively new industry, aquaculture is attracting young people who are looking to the future, planning for long-term careers.

Steve Fisher, Site Technician, Stolt Sea Farms: There's very few people that have been in the industry more than five or ten years. So, for myself, I can be here five or ten years and be looking at a management position or even assistant manager within a couple of years. I already have a lot of friends who are at that position right now, at 19 years old, assistant manager, 24, a manager. The list goes on. It's a very young industry. It's beautiful scenery. I mean, every morning you come out to work and you kind of just open your eyes and take a look around, the eagles are flying overhead, sometimes some whales are going passed. You can't beat it really. It's a beautiful environment.

And it's that beautiful environment that is essential to raising healthy farmed fish. The success of the industry depends on clean water. Aquaculture has developed under the watchful and protective eye of an environmentally conscious public. As much as anyone, this industry wants to ensure that the environment remains clean, healthy and productive. Success depends on it.

Kevin Onclin, Operations, Manager, Pacific National Group Ltd.: There are three fundamental fears that most environmentalists have about salmon farming. One is the genetic component, that the wild salmon and farmed salmon will mix. The other is non-indigenous species such as Atlantic salmon in the Pacific. They think that there's no reason to have non-indigenous species in these waters. And the third is more environmental degradation. There's been a lot of studies done worldwide by various federal, provincial bodies. You name it, it's been done. And the conclusions at the end of that is that done properly, salmon farming is a sustainable environmentally friendly industry. I would encourage environmentalists who are opposed to our industry to actually come out and have a look at our farms. We encourage it all the time. We've always been open and we've said "Come out, have a look, look underneath our pens if you're concerned. Have a look at the fish. Have a look at the whole operation."

Narrator: Clam, oyster and other shellfish farms are particularly dependent on clean water quality because shellfish are filter feeders, meaning they gather food by filtering nutrients directly from the water. If that water is polluted, then the shellfish will become contaminated. Shellfish, in effect, sound an early alarm in the event of poor water quality.

Dave Mitchell, President, Madrona Shellfish Ltd.: We're tested stringently by both the Department of Environment and Fisheries and Oceans, so if there's any hint of contamination, then we're shut down. So, we're kind of like the canary in the coalmine. We're the first indication that water quality may be deteriorating. The levels at which we're shut down are about 14 times lower than the levels that a swimming beach would be shut down. And so, if the shellfish beaches are shut down, you know that it's the first step towards widespread pollution. And so, we work very hard and we try and get the community involved and appreciative of the fact that we are there protecting their water quality.

Narrator: Farming shellfish on a strip of beach shares common elements with traditional vegetable farming. You stake off a piece of land. Plant your crop. Wait for it to grow and harvest a mature crop for market.

Mitchell: We start in the spring by purchasing seed, baby clams about a quarter inch in size and we seed them on the beds that need to be seeded and once the seed is in there, then it'll grow for about three years until it's harvestable. We maintain it by putting nets on top to keep the predators from eating the seed. The number of clams on the beach are 10 to 15 times what you would typically find on a wild beach. And so, the predators know that and they'll find them and eat the clams if we don't protect them in some way. Once the three years are up and the clams have reached about an inch and a half in size, they're ready for market. And we go through it and we harvest them, most of that is done by manual digging. The clams are shipped all over the world literally. There are markets opening up in Southeast Asia that appreciate the quality of our product and the fact that it comes from clean waters, and they are familiar with Canada as being a wide open space and a clean country and so, we can capitalize on that perception of quality.

Narrator: Like clams, oyster seed is also planted in beds along the beach. The beds are tended year-round for about four years before the oysters are ready for market. During low tides, day and night, in any weather, the beaches must be maintained and it's that constant maintenance that ensures a productive oyster bed and a profitable harvest.

Clark Munro, Beach Manager, Fanny Bay Oysters, Ltd.: We bring the seed out in those. (inaudible) bags, the plastic mesh bags, and we put them on the beach on racks for a year, the following summer, and then we open them up, spread them on the beach and let them grow there for two to four years basically. And then, we end up with something looking like this, which is a cluster, which is, you know, the old shell, the original shell that the seed was set on. The small baby oysters grow out and as you can see, they grow at different rates. Some of them who had more access to food grow up faster than the ones that are smaller underneath. Right at the moment, we're going around, breaking these clusters up to give the smaller ones, you know, more room to go.

Narrator: Started as a side business by former fisherman Glen Hadden 10 years ago, Fanny Bay Oysters now employs 60 people full-time, providing more jobs in the area than any other private sector employer.

Glen Hadden, President, Fanny Bay Oysters, Ltd.: Well, we've taken in 10 years of ranching operation and made it a farming operation. When you're farming, then you can supply the marketplace, 52 weeks of the year, there's no way that fishing for a product can compete with that kind of thing because you can offer the customer at the other end a sustainable, steady, consistent supply, both in quality and in time of arrival. We have the ability to harvest today and the product is consumed in Hong Kong tomorrow.

Jeanine Stacey, Production Manager, Fanny Bay Oysters Ltd.: The companies and individuals who are farming their environment, enhancing their environment really, and making use of things in a non-destructive, renewable fashion are the people who are going to have a feature. The shucking staff, the processing staff. I mean, this is 12 months a year, full-time employment, and we are continuing to grow.

Narrator: Not only do oysters get sold in the form of shucked meat, but the demand for single oysters in their shell has grown, as restaurants serve more oysters on the half-shell. Beach culture grows perfect hearty clusters for shucking, but getting single oysters can be tricky. This is a flupsy(?) or floating upwelling system, developed by Mid Isle Marine to produce single oysters. The oysters are separated by size and contained in bins below the water. A paddle wheel creates a current so that water flows continuously through the bins, providing the oysters with a constant supply of food, which they filter naturally from the water.

Judith Reid, Director, Mid Isle Marine Ltd.: The advantage this flupsy system gives is that it produces a single oyster that is strong enough to be able to go on the beach, live its life as a single oyster. And so, you have a much better product for the restaurant and market or for consumption where you're looking at a perfectly shaped oyster that isn't broken and is totally intact. So, by using the flupsy, we're able to reduce costs and increase the quality of our product.

Narrator: The seed for these oysters and other farmed species come from hatcheries. Hatcheries provide a constant supply of seed to farms, so farms are able to supply the market with mature product year-round. Hatchery seed can be produced selectively in order to grow a higher (inaudible) animal in a shorter amount of time. Island Scallops Ltd. has been producing scallop seed for aquaculture since 1989.

Rob Saunders, President, Island Scallops Ltd.: We have to bring in mature adults, male and female. We keep them in here in what we call our hotel. It's a nice place to come. We feed them properly. And they all have sex every Tuesday. And so, we collect the eggs, we collect the sperm. We artificially fertilize and we grow the larvae through where an animal like a scallop may have a .1% survival, we're running around 10% survival. One female produces in a spawning cycle, about 100 million eggs, so 10% of that is a significant number.

Narrator: The company is branching off to produce seed for other species as the aquaculture industry diversifies to satisfy market niches. For the past few years, they've been supplying goeduck duck seed to two farms and have begun experimenting with more exotic species such as goose-necked barnacles, urchins and sea cucumbers. At first glance, it may seem that aquaculture is a threat to traditional fisheries, but it's important to realize that farming is not meant to replace the wild fishery. Most of the species that are currently being harvested in the wild will continue to be harvested by commercial fisheries while specialized products and products that are not abundant in Canada are produced on farms.

Rob Saunders: On the West Coast, we have fishermen here that are approaching us to look for new species that they can do during the off-season. And now, the off-season is a majority of their time with a six-week fishing season, they're looking for something that they can use their skills and their equipment at. And they're looking for something for their sons and daughters to find a livelihood in. And this is really the key. In the next century, aquaculture is going to be a major source of income on the coast.

Narrator: Canada's East Coast has suffered great economic hardship from the closure of fisheries. By turning to aquaculture for species such as cod, we could give the wild stocks a chance to replenish while providing unemployed fishermen with work that will make use of their existing skills and tools.

Charlie Power, President, Sea Forest Plantation Company Ltd.: As everyone knows, Newfoundland has a tremendously chronically high unemployment problem. Now it's compounded by having a moratorium where there's 30,000 people out of work. Newfoundland has like 17,000 kilometres of coastline, most of it very sparsely populated, which means very clean water. We have people who obviously have an understanding of how to handle fish and we also have now. there's obviously a crying need to find other sources of employment for all these unemployed people. Two techniques that we have developed to raise farmed cod, one, was to take small wild cod and to just further grow it. It's a very quick process and most of that cod will double its weight in about 100 days. So from a fisherman or a plant worker's point of view, it's a nice way to earn family income and do it from June until October and November in any given year. Obviously, with now no access to wild small cod, we have to find another solution, and the solution is obviously a hatchery. We have 80,000 pounds of our own brood stock. We have started our own cod hatchery. A lot of persons want to stick to the old system, chasing around wild fish that's not going to be there for a long period of time. And I suppose it's like farming out west, I guess, when the first tractor showed up in Saskatchewan, I guess a lot of people were saying "hey, that's not going to work, we're going to stick to our horses" but a lot of things. as things change and modernize, then people have to be adaptable.

Narrator: This scallop farm has developed a new technology for producing scallops that grow twice as fast as wild scallops and which yield more meat per scallop. The scallops are suspended from longlines for the final grow-out stage just below the surface of the water.

Derryl Reid, Field Manager, Fisheries Resources Development Ltd.: The spinoff this company has with the people in the area is, basically, since the downturn of fishery, there's been a lot of displaced plant workers and fishery workers. What we're able to do is to tap into that resource. They already have the built-in skills. They're used to working around the water. They're used to working in fish plant environments. It doesn't take us much to take these people and train them up to do the work we're doing. You know, it's not a great shift for them.

Narrator: The only great shift is in how the product is obtained; a shift from fishing to farming.

Derryl Reid: We're creating a sustainable resource, you know, instead of taking away from the ocean, we're farming it. So what we take out of it, we put back. We're just like a farmer.

Narrator: Farming on the water is old hat for Wayne Somers. He's been growing mussels in Murray River, Prince Edward Island for 15 years.

Wayne Somers, President, Atlantic Mussel Growers Corporation Ltd.: Mussel growing is mussel farming. It's basically, you're a water farmer and the only thing we don't have to do to the mussels is feed them or fertilize them. But it's more of a farm than any other form of fishery. Aquaculture in PEI is creating a lot of full-time jobs, I mean, our plants run 52 weeks of the year, we have professional people hired, we have our office managers and sales managers. And it's been able to keep a lot of people here that didn't have to move away, that didn't have to go to Ontario or some place looking for that job. And we're creating more jobs all the time and the people here are thankful that we have an industry.

Narrator: Rural inland areas like northern Ontario are also making the most of their natural environment and clean water to join the trend in fresh seafood production. It took several years for former chief Pat Madahbee to convince other band members of the Ojibway First Nation on Manitoulin Island to invest in aquaculture.

Patrick Madahbee, Director, Wabuno Fish Farm: We started out, basically, with a small operation of four cages and then went to six, and in 1994, we expanded to 12. We're now producing over half a million pounds of rainbow trout per year. I guess we're also looking at expansion, doubling this cage site operation perhaps in another area. Hopefully, by this fall, we'll be building a processing plant and we'll be getting into our own marketing. (Inaudible) jobs, I think it's phenomenal here. We have had, in our community, unemployment rates as high as 70% in the winter months and anywhere from 40 to 50% during the summer months. So creating economic activity that has zero unemployment is very beneficial to our community. It's unique to this area. It's unique in the fact that we're the first Aboriginal community in Ontario to venture into this type of operation. Personally, I'm very excited about this operation, very proud of it. My dream for this operation is to get into the whole three phases finally of growing the fish, processing them, and the one that excites me the most is marketing the fish under our own label as Wabuno Fish Farm, a product of Ojibways of Sutter(?) Creek.

Narrator: Current trends and developments indicate that aquaculture production will continue to grow. In Canada alone, the industry has grown 24-fold in less than a decade. Today, Canadian aquaculture generates more than $300 million in revenue and provides jobs for more than 5,200 Canadians. And the industry has spurred the growth of a dynamic supplies and services sector to cater to the specific needs of aquaculturists. At a time when globalization of markets is posing challenges for resource-based industries, aquaculture is emerging as an exciting and sustainable new contender. It is an environmentally sound technique for producing high-quality fish and shellfish, and it's a proven source of employment and economic growth in our coastal and rural communities. With our abundant coastlines, skilled workers and advanced technologies, we can't afford not to farm our lakes and oceans.

Jeanine Stacey: We could be a world leader. We have one of the best coastlines on the planet and, you know, we could maximize it. We could farm 12 months a year in the ocean without problems and we have to be able to tap into that.

Derryl Reid: The wild fishery isn't going to supply Canada and the rest of the world. We have to look at farming.

Judith Reid: I definitely believe that the industry has a wonderful future and it requires a determination and an awareness on the part of the public to make sure that it is going to be carried on into the future and make sure provisions are made so that we can continue farming in the sea.

(End credits)