Farmed Atlantic Salmon info

[Guest guest]

Atlantic Salmon

Who farms it? Mainly Norway, followed by Chile and the UK. Worldwide

production exceeds one million tonnes a year.

How? Juveniles are produced from eggs 'stripped' from female broodstock

by hand and artificially inseminated. They are reared in freshwater

tanks (as parr), then 'put to sea' (as smolts) in cages housing 5,000 to

50,000 fish.

What's in it? The colourings astaxanthin (E161j) and canthaxanthin

(E161g) are used to dye flesh pink, though the permitted concentration

of canthaxanthin was reduced by the EU in 2002 due to links with retina

damage in humans. Fish are treated with antibiotics, some of which may

remain as residues, and routinely injected with vaccines. The fungicide

malachite green (a carcinogen) was banned last year, but traces have

since been found in four samples of ish salmon and two from Norway.

Because they are fed on fishmeal and oil extracted from 'trash fish'

living in polluted waters, farmed salmon may contain cancer-causing

PCBs, dioxins and mercury as well as pesticides. They contain more fat

than wild fish.

Are the fish harmed? Though intensive farms are cleaning up their act,

overstocking is still a problem. This contributes to the spread of

diseases such as ISA (infectious salmon anaemia). Fish are starved

before slaughter, then stunned with a blow to the head, followed by gill

cutting to bleed them to death. Some are anaesthetised in CO 2 , which

irritates the gills, then bled.

What about the planet? Diseased salmon can easily escape from cages and

infect wild stock. Farmed fish that have lost their ability to migrate

can breed with wild salmon, diminishing their urge to spawn. The

chemicals cypermethrin, azamethiphos, teflubenzuron and emamectin

benzoate (used to treat sea lice), together with faecal waste, pollute

the oceans.