Chile's quake benefits B.C. salmon farmers

Quintin Winks
March 4, 2010
The Alberni Valley Times

Farming Atlantic salmon has become big business in Chile in recent years, but disease and a catastrophic earthquake in the South American country have shifted demand to Canadian fish farmers.

That's good news for Feeding Systems Canada, a Port Alberni based fish farm supplier. Owner Roy Hines said his business, which is fueled in large part by demand for farmed fish in the United States, had a poor year in 2009 thanks to a major downturn in the global economy. But this year things are looking decidedly better. After halving the number of staff to about five in the past two years, Hines is considering hiring again.

In recent years the production of Chilean farmed fish has been devastated first by disease and then all but wiped out by the Feb. 26 earthquake and resulting tsunami.

"It's keeping the prices up in Canada and the companies are spending a bit more of their money here," said Hines. "That's where all the profit's coming from right now."

Colleen Dane, spokesperson for the B.C. Salmon Farmer's Association, said that demand continues to outstrip supply for the province's fish farmers, but efforts to increase supply from B.C. waters for now are mired in bureaucratic red tape.

Fish farming has been controversial in recent years after being blamed for contributing to the decline of wild fish stocks and for increasing pollution on the sea bed. It's that controversy, as well as questions that have arisen around industry practices, that could be leading to the moratorium on expansion licenses.

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