Salmon farming: Push to investigate onshore option for expanding Tasmanian industry
Updated
Tasmania's Shooters and Fishers Party is pushing for land-based salmon farming, saying the move would silence the industry's critics.
The party believes with the industry's projected dramatic expansion, and a growing groundswell of concern from the fishing community, it was time to consider options other than ocean pens.
Vice-chairman Ken Orr said land-based salmon farming was being introduced around the world, including in the United States, Denmark, and on the Chinese-Mongolian border.
He said the practice would eliminate uncertainty and many of the ocean open-cage controversies plaguing the industry in Tasmania.
"You don't have the issues with anyone saying that you're trashing the environment," Mr Orr said.
"You can maintain water temperature, you can maintain oxygen levels, you can do everything that you can't do in a wild environment, on land base. So why not? Let's look at it."
Mr Orr said the idea deserved serious consideration from all levels of government, and said it could also boost employment.
"Why can't our salmon farmers look at this sort of production? That's all we're asking," Mr Orr said.
"You don't have the seal issues, you don't have the sea lice and freshwater bathing, you don't have the issues with escaped salmon."
Mr Orr said the party wanted an independent body should explore the idea.
Tasmania 'years behind' international trend
Grassroots group Neighbours of Fish Farming also supported the push.
"Sweden has just banned marine-based salmon farming and [is] demanding that the industry move everything onshore within three years," group spokeswoman Christine Materia.
"If you think about Tassal and Huon Aquaculture, they report that they're using the world's best standards, and in actual fact they're about 20 years behind countries like Sweden."
The group has organised a community meeting on Bruny Island in what it said was in response to concerns about possible impacts of any future salmon farming in Storm Bay.
"Given what's happened in Macquarie Harbour and also in the [D'Entrecasteaux] Channel in the Huon and the degradation of the environment ... there's reason to be concerned about this expansion," Dr Materia said.
Major producers turning to Storm Bay
Huon Aquaculture and Tassal have both previously flagged development of the sector in Storm Bay.
The industry was again in the spotlight last week, after Huon released vision of what it claimed was independently-sourced evidence of a second so-called "dead-zone" beneath Macquarie Harbour and in the vicinity of Tasmania's Wilderness World Heritage Area (TWWHA).
At the time the vision was released, the State Government and environmental regulator, the EPA, committed to ongoing monitoring of the site, but said there was no evidence "significant" damage to the TWWHA had occurred.
Tasmanian Environment Minister Matthew Groom called on the EPA in Parliament to provide further information.
Huon Aquaculture has taken the regulators to court over their management of the sector in Macquarie Harbour, but insists the move has nothing to do with commercial rivalry against competitor Tassal.
Huon and the Tasmanian Greens have called on the Federal Government to launch a full investigation into potential damage within the TWWHA.
Federal inspectors visited the site last month.
A spokesman for Federal Environment Minister Josh Frydenberg said yesterday the Government was unable to comment, in light of the court case.
Topics: fishing-aquaculture, environmental-management, oceans-and-reefs, tas
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