Salmon farming not sustainable

I HOPE Alex Salmond and his environment ministers found time to read your article “Sandeel catch linked to decline in seabirds” (News, 1 December).

One reason for the industrial sandeel fishery is to produce pellets to feed to salmon in the many Norwegian-owned floating factory fish farms around our coast. Sandeels are also used at salmon farms around the Norwegian coast which are supplying more and more of the salmon in Scottish shops while Scottish-produced salmon is shipped to China, where Norwegian salmon is banned.

Over the past year Scottish Government ministers have implied that factory farming of salmon is sustainable. Indeed in one pro-salmon farming press release the Government used the word “sustainable” ten times.

The fact of the matter is that you have to use between two and four tonnes of ever scarcer wild fish to produce just one tonne of farmed salmon. That is not sustainable.

John F Robins, Secretary to Animal Concern Advice Line