e-463 (Fishing industry)

Petition to the House of Commons

• West Coast wild salmon are under threat from disease, pollutants, and sea lice originating from open net-cage fish farms;
• In 2015, the Federal Court of Canada ordered Fisheries & Oceans Canada to stop granting licenses that allow transfer of disease-carrying farmed salmon into ocean net pens without Ministerial oversight;
• Over 80% of B.C. farmed salmon appear infected with the highly contagious piscine reovirus associated with heart disease in salmon;
• West Coast wild salmon support over 9,000 coastal community jobs, cultural traditions, and complex ecosystems, including contributing to coastal forests, which produce the oxygen we breathe;
• Canada can become a world leader in safe and reliable closed containment fish farming on the West Coast; and
• Fin Donnelly, MP Port Moody-Coquitlam, introduced Bill C-228 to protect West Coast wild salmon, an Act to amend the Fisheries Act (closed containment aquaculture), requiring West Coast finfish aquaculture to transition rapidly from harmful open net-cage fish farms to safe and reliable closed containment facilities.