Commercial fisheries targeting pink salmon on British Columbia’s north coast have discarded over 1.37lbs of chum salmon over the past month, enough to fill 40 transport trucks.
“Not only is it wasteful and unsustainable to allow this sort of fishery in this day and age, but it is also unnecessary”, concluded Aaron Hill, ecologist with Watershed Watch. “The pink salmon these fishermen are targeting could easily be harvested using techniques that would ensure high survival of discarded fish from depleted stocks. All that’s required is some leadership from Minister Ashfield in Ottawa. What’s stopping him?”
