Can tech solve salmon industry's biggest problem?

DW (English)

Salmon farming is a booming industry with big problems. From the widespread use of chemicals, to threats to wild salmon stocks, it's marred by mass die-offs and deadly diseases. Can tech solve its crippling problems?

Transcript

00:00Salmon farming is a billion-dollar business, and sales figures continue to rise.

00:07Norway and Chile are the biggest players.

00:10We visit one of the biggest salmon farms in the world,

00:13which has invested in new technology,

00:15and a whistleblower from Chile reports on the industry's dark side.

00:23Find out why on Transforming Business.

00:27In recent decades, one scandal after another.

00:31Mass salmon die-offs, deadly infectious diseases.

00:35The fish are treated with antibiotics and chemicals to fight parasites and disease.

00:40Is it still the same narrative?

00:42We take a look at Norway, the world's largest salmon producer.

00:47The profits of fish farms there have risen massively since 2015

00:52to over 3.5 billion euros in 2022.

01:02It may look like a ship, but the company says it's the world's biggest fish farm.

01:07It's run by Nordlax, a huge aquaculture farm in northern Norway.

01:12The nets reach 56 meters deep into the sea.

01:15Around 2.5 million salmon swim around in them.

01:18The farm has been designed so that fewer fish get sick or die,

01:22according to the sales and marketing director.

01:28Normally we run at mortality rates, I would say around 5%, 4 to 6, over the last five years.

01:35The fact that mortality rates are so low at the farm is due in part to this laser gun.

01:41But more on that later.

01:45The average mortality rate throughout Norway is significantly higher at 17%.

01:50One problem with aquaculture? Parasites, such as the salmon louse,

01:55which repeatedly attack the fish.

01:57It's a crustacean that can kill the salmon.

01:59That's why Nordlax gives the infested farmed salmon freshwater baths.

02:04And they also use chemical baths to remove the salmon lice.

02:07But this can make the animals sick.

02:12One of the main reasons is handling due to treatment against salmon lice.

02:20To remove salmon lice now entails a lot of treatment,

02:23and that treatment is stressful for the fish.

02:25And then they can, for instance, develop wounds afterwards.

02:29This is Erik Bering. His institute checks the health of the fish.

02:36There's another problem.

02:37Farmed salmon keep escaping from the nets and transmitting the salmon louse to wild salmon.

02:42When farmed in wild salmon mate, their offspring displace the wild salmon stalks.

02:48This is another reason why the wild Atlantic salmon is among the world's endangered species.

02:58This farm uses a laser beam to remove salmon lice.

03:01It's supposed to cut the infection rate and stop the fish from becoming too weak.

03:08The farm is also located in the open sea, not in a fjord.

03:12The moving freshwater is supposed to reduce the disease infestation.

03:16Sediment and excrement are washed away more easily by the ocean currents.

03:20But this is only standard practice on this farm.

03:23Nordlax says that it also operates 40 conventional farms in fjords.

03:27Like the entire industry, the company is under pressure.

03:30It has to invest in environmentally friendly facilities, and it can afford to do so.

03:37Global farmed salmon revenue grew from over 13 billion euros in 2017 to more than 20 billion in 2022.

03:45There's good money to be made from salmon.

03:48Ingeberg Nordlax's owner has made a fortune worth hundreds of millions of euros.

03:53It's a similar story for billionaires Gustav Witze and his son Gustav Magner of the Salmar company.

03:59Aquaculture is growing more and more compared with fishing, although globally most fish are still caught.

04:08But that is changing.

04:10Aquaculture production surpassed fishing in 2023, with 97 million tons.

04:23But fish farming is controversial.

04:26When it comes to salmon, many ask whether the species is suited to aquaculture.

04:30The reason? It's a predatory fish that needs both a certain amount of fish in its feed as well as soy.

04:50After Norway, Chile is a leading producer of farmed salmon, followed by Britain, Canada and the Faroe Islands, which belong to Denmark.

05:01In Chile, salmon companies and investors from Norway such as Schermach, Movi and Salmar have expanded into the country.

05:09Even conglomerate Mitsubishi operates there.

05:16In a key salmon farming region in Chile, we meet whistleblower Mario Ángel Uribe.

05:22He worked in an aquaculture facility owned by Nova Austral until 2021 and publicized the salmon farm's breach of environmental regulations.

05:52The Chilean Environmental Supervisory Authority, SMA, imposed a heavy fine on Nova, and they had to close some farms.

06:23But another problem affects Chile's entire salmon farming industry.

06:28Antibiotics are used on a massive scale to fight infectious disease.

06:33Critics, like veterinarian Lisbeth Fandamer, says this endangers both humans and animals.

06:53More antibiotics are used in Chile's fish farms than anywhere else in the world.

06:59339 tons in 2023.

07:02There is less systematic monitoring and fewer sanctions than in Europe.

07:07These conditions have made it easy for salmon farmers from Norway to expand into Chile.

07:12But what might better monitoring of salmon farms look like?

07:17For example, Norway has been developing an interactive monitoring system for about 10 years.

07:23It receives data every week.

07:25The hundreds of salmon farms in the country are obliged to enter comprehensive data on various fish diseases.

07:32And there is a traffic light system.

07:34Red production zones means salmon lice infestation or that infections per fish are too high.

07:41The traffic light system is such that it defines whether you are allowed to increase your production or not.

07:47And this is based on the way that the different companies, farmers, control sea lice.

07:58This is virologist Einstein Evansen.

08:01He researches salmon diseases.

08:04But how reliable is this system, which is based on self-reporting?

08:08Authorities conduct random checks, which can lead to sanctions, fines or prison sentences.

08:15Any disease, treatment, diagnosis of notifiable diseases and so on.

08:34Occasionally we go out and count together.

08:38We make them count first and then we count and we compare the numbers.

08:43That's Lisa Charlotta Råkonus. Her team monitors fish health in Norway.

08:51Mostly it is correct. And we have some that is not correct.

08:57And it depends on the severity of the wrongdoing here.

09:06Chile's Economic Affairs Ministry also wants to improve the monitoring system

09:10for the country's hundreds of breeding facilities.

09:16One such measure is that the farms must report on the amount of antibiotics

09:20or other chemicals they use.

09:23But how does the monitoring work?

09:29It's of course difficult to, let's say, know in detail.

09:36But the numbers from Chile have been more and more precise over the last years

09:42and they have been more and more detailed.

09:45But what does this mean for consumers?

09:47How can they find out which fish they are buying in the supermarket?

09:51There are many different quality labels.

09:53They all define global standards for the farming of fish.

09:57Companies that want to gain certification from the Aquaculture Stewardship Council, or ASC,

10:02must comply with specific upper limits for infectious disease or fish mortality.

10:09So we call it impose certain standards.

10:12And that is always positive and always needed.

10:17But it should also be a motivation for the farmer to produce under good,

10:22let's say, both welfare conditions and health conditions

10:25and document at a detailed level what you're actually doing.

10:29The ASC label is one of the world's largest.

10:32Most licensed fish farms must pay fees to be part of it.

10:35The organization has the farms inspected.

10:38The ASC says that several hundred fish farms are licensed in Norway alone.

10:46If they're not able to do this, the label or the certification gets withdrawn or even cancelled.

10:53So in the end they drop out of the program.

10:56This is Tobias Haug. He represents ASC in German-speaking countries.

11:01We can see that actually.

11:02For example, in Norway in 2023 alone, 52 salmon farms had to withdraw from our program

11:10because they couldn't meet the requirements.

11:13But let's take another look at a completely new trend, closed aquaculture.

11:19In Norway, we meet a farm manager with a pioneering spirit.

11:23The company he works for says over one million salmon swim in its 30 breeding tanks.

11:29They do not use nets.

11:31The tanks' outer walls are made of plastic.

11:37We're trying to find a new way of doing salmon farming

11:41and our goal is to reach the utopia of having the world's most sustainable salmon farming.

11:47The benefit? The salmon louse cannot penetrate the tank's plastic outer layer

11:53and the farmed salmon cannot escape.

11:55A filter collects the fish excrement, which is then pumped to the surface.

12:00It is then dried and used for biogas plants or as fertilizer.

12:05We're the only salmon farmer that I know that don't have sea lice

12:09and when the fish gets to thrive inside of a good environment, we have very good growth.

12:16Environmental problems and the health of salmon are the biggest challenges facing the industry.

12:21More and more salmon are being produced as a result of aquaculture.

12:25But uniform international standards and controls must be introduced

12:29to guarantee sustainable management in the sector and a reliable quality product.

12:46www.fisheries.noaa.gov

12:48www.fisheries.noaa.gov

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