U.K. group eyes eco-approval for Fraser sockeye

Brian Lewis
July 8th, 2010
The Province

Are European and Asian consumers being conned into buying B.C. salmon under the pretence that our fish are harvested in ways that preserve stock health and protect the marine ecosystems?

More to the point, are Fraser River sockeye about to be included in this "eco-label" certification scheme?

These kinds of questions keep people like Craig Orr, executive director of Watershed Watch Salmon Society, awake at night — because if the answer is "yes" to those questions, then we have a problem.

At the heart of this issue is a U.K.-based non-profit organization known as the Marine Stewardship Council, which utilizes independent third parties to investigate and subsequently certify specific fisheries throughout the world as meeting MSC criteria.

Thus, once certified, products from that fishery can carry the distinctive blue MSC label on the packaging — which, obviously, is intended to give consumers confidence that what they buy doesn't degrade the environment.

However, is this certification more about selling fish than protecting fisheries?

The MSC recently certified three B.C. sockeye-salmon fisheries — the Skeena and Nass rivers sockeye and the Barclay Sound sockeye.

Keep in mind that all three fisheries contain threatened and endangered salmon stocks that Orr says are "routinely" overharvested. "As disturbing as this is, the MSC has placed several conditions for improvement on these fisheries and we will be watching closely to see if these conditions are enforced," he adds.

But incredibly, Orr says the MSC was about to grant a similar certification to the Fraser River sockeye fishery — that is until Watershed Watch, the David Suzuki Foundation and SkeenaWild Conservation Trust collectively raised a red flag.

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