I have used Loch Duart salmon for many years, because I believe they are the gold standard in fish farming. I have always believed them when the guys at Loch Duart say they are committed to running their salmon farm on the northwest coast of Scotland sustainably. Their product is very good, the ownership is Scottish and they contribute a lot to employment in their local community. Their business is run on ethical lines, and their care for their surroundings has won them ISO 14000 certification, meaning that they are compliant with very high international standards for reducing their negative impact on the environment, and comply with all local and national legislation. They employ an integrated aquaculture, cultivating a native species sea urchin that feeds on the beds below. They grow indigenous seaweeds that take out the nitrates and phosphates that the salmon put in. The salmon are farmed in low density in the open seas so they naturally swim against the currents, this provides a firm flesh similar to that of wild salmon. They employ a year-long fallowing system across their sites allowing the area to recover. The fish feed comes from sustainable non-GM sources.
They don't dose their salmon with antibiotics either for prophylaxis or for treatment. Their good animal welfare practices have been recognised by Freedom Food, the RSPCA assurance scheme - which means that their fish have enough space and food, and aren't subjected to unusual stresses.
On top of this, the quality of Loch Duart salmon is attested to by the reputations of their customers - top restaurants all over the world, including Le Manoir and Brasseries Blanc. They seem to be a model fish farm, and if fish have to be farmed (and of course they do, as we have so seriously depleted our stocks of so many wild fish) - this would seem to be the way to do it.
However, accidents happen.
Last November 9 a passing boat seems to have cut a hole in one of their pens, and 4,000 salmon swam away into the sea. The company has suffered a dreadful financial loss - £80,000 said the local press. There has been a fuss in the press and in the Scottish Parliament about publishing some of Loch Duart's escape and information release policies, but I have received satisfactory replies from them to my own questions. Loch Duart has had four escapes since 2005, losing about 23,000 fish, and November's was the first in two years, they say. They are always trying to improve their equipment and security.
I've been dealing with Nick Joy and Andrew Bing of Loch Duart for several years, and they retain my confidence.
The problem with all fish farming is the question of accidents. We all know that the wild stock of Atlantic salmon is dwindling, and we do not want anything to happen to lower their population further (for example, by competing with them for food) or to alter their genetic make-up.
Here is the rub. We also know that businessmen are already experimenting with farming genetically modified salmon. One such company is AquaBounty, which brands its GM salmon AquAdvantage. It is getting around the objections about accidents by breeding their stock in Canada, using land-based pens in Panama to grow the fish - for the moment. They grow much faster than natural fish and are voracious feeders. Some of their genes come from the Pacific Chinook salmon (so there's a question as to whether they can be farmed legally in Atlantic waters), but another of their transplanted genes is from the Atlantic fish, the ocean pout.
Though they're engineered to be sterile, it is estimated that up to 5% would be fertile and able to breed with our native Salmo salar. It seems possible that it is not legal to grow AquAdvantage fish in American open waters. But given transport costs and the question of the carbon footprint of fish farming, if GM salmon are to be farmed profitably and with even a minimal nod of respect to the environment, it does not take a financial genius to see that it will have eventually to be done in the open sea.
So the question posed by this unhappy episode of Loch Duart is, can anything be done to prevent farmed GM salmon from escaping? Sadly, the lesson of the Loch Duart escape is, NO: of course GM salmon farmed in Atlantic waters can, and will escape. This is why we must all oppose their introduction with all the vigour we can muster. We should be alarmed if we learned that the escaped Loch Duart salmon were interbreeding with wild stock (there is no evidence of this so far). How much worse it would be if S.salmar were wiped out by losing the competition for food to GM salmon, or destroyed by interbreeding!
Readers, a few questions to you - What is the solution? Can you afford to put wild salmon on your menu? Will you buy salmon from Alaska? Does the carbon footprint worry you? Do you buy farmed salmon? Are you concerned by the conditions in which your salmon is farmed? And what qualities do you look for when you buy it? Do you embrace a particular quality assurance scheme, or do you buy on price alone? Do you think aquaculture is sustainable? We've given a great deal of thought to these questions, and at Le Manoir, Gary Jones and I will be sticking with Loch Duart.
Best
RB
Here is the rub. We also know that businessmen are already experimenting with farming genetically modified salmon. One such company is AquaBounty, which brands its GM salmon AquAdvantage. It is getting around the objections about accidents by breeding their stock in Canada, using land-based pens in Panama to grow the fish - for the moment. They grow much faster than natural fish and are voracious feeders. Some of their genes come from the Pacific Chinook salmon (so there's a question as to whether they can be farmed legally in Atlantic waters), but another of their transplanted genes is from the Atlantic fish, the ocean pout.
Though they're engineered to be sterile, it is estimated that up to 5% would be fertile and able to breed with our native Salmo salar. It seems possible that it is not legal to grow AquAdvantage fish in American open waters. But given transport costs and the question of the carbon footprint of fish farming, if GM salmon are to be farmed profitably and with even a minimal nod of respect to the environment, it does not take a financial genius to see that it will have eventually to be done in the open sea.
So the question posed by this unhappy episode of Loch Duart is, can anything be done to prevent farmed GM salmon from escaping? Sadly, the lesson of the Loch Duart escape is, NO: of course GM salmon farmed in Atlantic waters can, and will escape. This is why we must all oppose their introduction with all the vigour we can muster. We should be alarmed if we learned that the escaped Loch Duart salmon were interbreeding with wild stock (there is no evidence of this so far). How much worse it would be if S.salmar were wiped out by losing the competition for food to GM salmon, or destroyed by interbreeding!
Readers, a few questions to you - What is the solution? Can you afford to put wild salmon on your menu? Will you buy salmon from Alaska? Does the carbon footprint worry you? Do you buy farmed salmon? Are you concerned by the conditions in which your salmon is farmed? And what qualities do you look for when you buy it? Do you embrace a particular quality assurance scheme, or do you buy on price alone? Do you think aquaculture is sustainable? We've given a great deal of thought to these questions, and at Le Manoir, Gary Jones and I will be sticking with Loch Duart.
Best
RB
Raymond,
You ask very clear and cogent questions and have obviously thought a lot about your salmon supply and sustainability (which many chefs do not). Farmed salmon in Europe is sustainable. We have learned much in the short 30 year period since the first fish were put to sea. Irish farmers now implement stocking and feeding regimes to comply with organic status, so that 80% of our fish is now certified as organic. We led the world in offshore farming in sites which are among the harshest in the world but good for the fish. We produce in one year what Norway produces in one week, but that production is very important for the small coastal communities where we operate. The more food we produce from our seas by farming or wild catch, the more likely we are to respect that environment and less likely to pollute it. We must regard our seas as space to grow food, the best that we can. Locally sourced fish and shellfish, farmed by knowledgeable and experienced people who cannot afford to make mistakes is the way forward. Keep supporting sustainably farmed seafood and you will be supporting a huge network of genuine, passionate people who want to work and live in the places they belong.
Richie