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Submission:
Open net pen salmon farms are scientifically and compellingly linked to the decline of wild salmon stock world wide. Clearly there are other causes for the fluctuation in salmon stock, many beyond our control. But salmon farms are one we DO know about and CAN control. We must rid our BC coasts of these farms, and require the transition to closed containment immediately. The fact that the disease information has been kept secret, worse, suppressed, is indication that those in charge, the DFO, have not been doing their job. It is the MANDATE to protect our fisheries. Please require that they do this.
They have the mandate to promote aquaculture, too, but they cannot and must not do this in a way that conflicts with, and actually threatens, wild stock. Many types of fish can be farmed, tilapia, carp, and industry should focus on these. Salmon can be farmed on land too, but farming fish that eat fish, such as salmon, is destroying other fish stocks around the world, and it would be best to transition to farming other kinds of fish. But the bottom line is: Get salmon feedlots out of our oceans. Thank you for all the detailed work you are doing, and the information you are gathering. Please make the right decision and recommendation, so we are doing all we can to preserve our wild salmon.
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