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Rally - Ocean Fish Farms, Ticking Virus Bombs? - Environmental Communication Options/Huff Strategy

Rally - Ocean Fish Farms, Ticking Virus Bombs?

Jan 12th, 2016 6:14 AM

Media Advisory Who: Wild Salmon Defenders Alliance What: Rally - Ocean Fish Farms, Ticking Virus Bombs? When: Thursday, January 14, 2016 11:00 a.m. Where: Dept. of Fisheries and Oceans, 401 Pender Street, Vancouver A rally will be held at the Department of Fisheries, Oceans and Canadian Coast Guard office Thursday, January 14th to raise public awareness about the danger fish farms pose to wild salmon, which supports many jobs in a diverse economy and helps sustain the biodiversity upon which we depend. Wild Salmon Defenders are mobilizing to be outside the DFO office for the rally with signs, banners, drummers and singers and statements from stakeholders. With long overdue action on the Cohen Commission, the aggressive intent of the ocean fish farm industry to expand, and new scientific evidence the ISA virus is in B.C. waters, there is no time to waste. “It is extremely urgent for the Liberal government to meet with scientists publishing on the ISA virus, and the First Nations Wild Salmon Alliance (FNWSA) to avoid the unimaginable - the loss or disappearance of wild salmon due to viruses such as ISA,” stated Jim Hobart, Chief of the Spuzzum First Nation (east of Yale, B.C.) and member of the FNWSA. “The fish farm industry approach of attacking the peer-reviewed science only emphasizes the need for immediate open and transparent virus testing of farmed salmon in those open-net pens,” added Chief Hobart. “We are all in favour of long overdue testing of ocean farmed salmon, but what is also required is an immediate stop to any expansion of open-net farms on the migration routes of wild salmon,” insisted Chief Michelle Lee Edwards of Sekw’el’wes First Nation in Lillooet. For more information, or to schedule interviews contact: Eddie Gardner, Wild Salmon Defenders Alliance Coordinator 604-792-0867 or singingbear@telus.net The Wild Salmon Defenders Alliance (WSDA) is dedicated to the removal of industrial fish farms from the migration routes of wild salmon in British Columbia, and supports an emerging, land-based aquaculture industry that would be regulated for sustainability. WSDA holds regular “ocean farmed salmon boycotts” at retail stores to raise awareness about the adverse impacts open-net salmon farms have on human health, the marine environment and wild salmon. WSDA strongly advocates for the application of the precautionary principle to support the resurgence of wild salmon. Recently the WSDA has called on Federal Fisheries Minister Hunter Tootoo to meet with the First Nations Wild Salmon Alliance at the earliest possibility to address the plunging salmon returns in B.C. as a meaningful step in “a smarter co-management of our ocean.” To learn more, go to the website www.farmed-salmon-boycott.com