If They Must Obey Laws
Salmon Farm Operators Question Ability to Survive 

MISTY EDGECOMB / Bangor Daily News 12aug03

Layoffs predicted after loss of appeal on restrictions

A week after a federal appeals court decided court-ordered restrictions on salmon farming will stand, two of Maine's biggest aquaculture operations, Stolt Sea Farm and Atlantic Salmon of Maine, are figuring out how to survive. Staff members are still running the numbers, but the outlook isn't good, Steve Page, environmental compliance officer for Atlantic Salmon of Maine, said Monday.

"It's going to be significant. There will probably be layoffs," he said. "A lot of things are still in flux. It's quite confusing for us right now."

Atlantic Salmon and Stolt employ dozens of Mainers and make up about half of the state's annual $65 million in salmon production with their combined harvest of 4 million pounds.

To meet the court's requirements, all of the companies' farm sites that are currently occupied - about half of the total sites - will have to remain empty once the current generations of fish are harvested over the next year.

Typically, salmon farms have kept pens fallow between generations of fish to decrease the spread of disease, but for a matter of weeks or months, not two to three years as mandated by the court.

Even when the companies can restock the pens, they may struggle to find court-approved fish to do so.

In May, the state's commissioner of Marine Resources, George LaPointe, called the judge's orders "full-body blows" for an already battered industry.

Down the road, the lost generations of fish will lead to harvest gaps that will hurt the companies' bottom lines, Page said.

But in the past, entire generations of fish have been lost to weather or disease. Salmon farming survived other difficulties and can survive the fallowing, he said.

Perhaps more challenging is the order that all fish stocked in Maine must be 100 percent native North American salmon, in an effort to protect the small populations of federally endangered wild Atlantic salmon found in Washington County rivers that flow into Cobscook Bay, the heart of the state's salmon-farming industry.

Thousands of hatchery salmon with European genes that had been bound for Maine waters may lose their market value, or even be destroyed. Sources for native salmon fry are almost unknown. And scientific disputes over salmon genetics abound, so that defining a "native" fish is more complicated than it might first appear.

Atlantic Salmon has been searching for native salmon stocks from Canada, but has not been successful. It's doubtful that fish will be stocked this fall, though company officials are hopeful about next spring, Page said.

"We're not sure that we can get the fish we need," he said.

A spokeswoman for Stolt could not be reached for comment Monday.

The environmental groups that brought the lawsuits out of concern over water pollution are pleased with the outcome and plan to keep a close eye on the companies' compliance with court orders, a spokesman said Monday.

In 2000, a coalition of environmentalists led by the National Environmental Law Center sued Atlantic Salmon, which is based in Belfast, and Stolt, based in Lubec.

Last year, a federal judge decided the salmon farms were in fact violating the Clean Water Act, then ordered the companies to comply with a long list of strict regulations designed to protect water quality, including the provisions on fallowing and on nonnative fish.

Last week, a panel of judges from the First Circuit Court of Appeals in Boston upheld the restrictions.

Further appeals by Atlantic Salmon of Maine are unlikely, Page said Monday. Stolt has not yet made a public statement about its plans.

The companies' lawyer had unsuccessfully argued that the state of Maine, not a federal judge, should have the right to regulate salmon farming.

Since the initial court order, Maine's Board of Environmental Protection has drafted detailed salmon farming regulations as part of its general finfish aquaculture permitting process

Four of Atlantic Salmon of Maine's 14 sites have been certified by the general permit, with four more applications pending. Two Stolt sites have been certified since the permit was completed in June, according to the Maine Department of Environmental Protection.

However, the companies' arguments that the more lenient state standards should supercede the court requirements failed, so the companies will have to abide by both the state and court conditions.