Since the 1970’s Norway’s salmon production has increased from under 1,000 tons to 1.2 million tons in 2014. The financial success of the industry is without doubt, but is increasingly meeting opposition from fishers and conservationists who are particularly concerned about sea lice and escapee impacts on wild populations.

Whilst salmon aquaculture has both the capacity and market access to increase production, the Minister of Fisheries declared that significant reduction of sea lice and escapee are needed before growth can continue.

In an effort to allow growth of this increasingly important sector for Norway’s economy whilst minimising its ecological footprint, the Government have introduced four reforms to push ‘the greening of Norwegian salmon production’.

Tough sanctions have already been introduced for violation of sea lice limits in farms.  Earlier this year, Mattilsynet (the Norwegian Food Safety Authority) issued warning letters to farms in areas where sea lice levels have traditionally been over the limit, stating that stocking up on these sites must be halved in the next production cycle.  Mattilsynet powers go beyond imposing restriction – they can require salmon in heavily infested farms to be slaughtered.

The other three reforms, all aimed at allowing expansion, are still under development.  ‘Green licences’ will give aquaculturalists the ability to expand production, if they committed to solutions aimed at reducing sea lice and escapees through measures such as using laser cannons to shot sea lice, and skirts outside of net pens.  A ‘5% increase scheme’ would allow aquaculturalists to increase production by 5%, provided they can keep sea lice frequency down to 0.1 adult female sea lice per salmon in a production cycle - and with a maximum of two delousing treatments.  Finally, the new ‘growth regime’ will place greater responsibility for environmental standards on aquaculturalists, with growth only being allowed where it is ‘biologically sustainable’. 

Professor Hersoug notes that the four reforms focus on one indicator for environmental health – adult female sea lice frequency, reported by aquaculturalists.  Using one indicator for environmental health is likely insufficient, though further indicators may be introduced later.  Furthermore, the link between sea lice frequency and the poor condition of wild salmon and trout is still contested, as is the critical value for sea lice frequency in farms. 

For some aquaculturalists, reaching targets may prove unrealistic.  Concerns regarding the fairness and legality of essentially collective punishment sanctions issued by Mattilsynet have also been raised.  Stakeholders have already noted that some aquaculturalists are under-reporting sea lice frequency.  It only takes one bad aquaculturalist in an area for all farms to receive sanctions – or have salmon slaughtered. 

Much of the success of the reforms will lie in their implementation, technical feasibility, political support, and cooperation of aquaculturalists. Nevertheless it is generally accepted that reduction of sea lice in aquaculture will reduce impact to wild populations – and the cost of delousing, which currently costs in the region of NOK 3 billion a year.

This story appeared at The Fish Site.