06.01.10
Several groups are advocating against net-pen salmon farms in favor of wild salmon stocks due to pollutants and environmental concerns. “That innocuous piece of salmon on your plate has a sordid history,” said Lauren Hornor, of Fraser Riverkeeper in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, co-creator of the Stand Up for Pacific Salmon (SUPS) campaign. “As citizens of the Pacific coast, we’re concerned about the impact our buying choices have on wild salmon.” The group Fraser Riverkeeper is one of more than 20 Waterkeeper organizations from Alaska to California that launched the SUPS campaign in their watersheds. Using a cartoon, a documentary film and informational pamphlets, the groups are educating West Coast consumers about the impact of purchasing net-pen farmed salmon—and calling on the “Big Six” grocery retailers to remove the product from their shelves. The SUPS campaign asks customers of Costco, Safeway, Tesco, Kroger, SuperValu and Trader Joe’s to follow the example of their fellow retailer Target. In January the discount chain, on the advice of the Monterey Bay Aquarium’s SeafoodWatch program, dropped net-pen salmon from more than 1700 stores. Because of the presence of PCBs and other substances, the journal Environmental Research recommends that farmed salmon should be eaten no more than “between 0.4 and 1 meal per month.” This confirmed a similar 2005 study in the Journal of Nutrition, recommending that pregnant women, children and nursing mothers avoid farmed salmon because of high levels of pollutants. Other concerns for consumers include the industry’s use of antibiotics and artificial coloring.