Second only to the waste industry, the fish farm industry -aka aquaculture – was the worst offender in Scotland for environmental pollution.
The Scottish Environmental Protection Agency [SEPA] has listed 50 fish farm sites across Scotland in its account of Scotland’s worst polluters.
The focus of offending is on sea bed pollution.
Two Argyll fish farms – both in Loch Etive – have been named in this list.
- Port na Mine Fish Farm – described as Very Poor – for using an unauthorised site and for issues related to data and envirinmental monitoring.
- Loch Etive Fish Farm – for the submission of unsatisfactory monitoring reports, breaches of authorised stock density and unreliable data.
Both of these sites are operated by Dawnfresh, a name not infrequently in the media for various concerns as to its operations.
The Scottish Salmon Producers Organisation has dismissed these issues as ‘largely administrative’.
Data and record keeping are indeed ‘administrative’ – but they provide the evidence for the environmental performance of fish farms, good or bad. This in an essentially dishonest spin.
Companies making the massive profits that the fish farm industry makes – profits largely shipped out to foreign owners and shareholders – have the resources to get their ‘administrative’ systems up to acceptable levels.
