As local First Nations call for greater protection of the precious resource, the B.C. government is contributing an extra $17.25 million for efforts to save declining populations of wild Pacific salmon.
The Ministry of Water, Land and Resource Stewardship said Thursday the bulk of it will be shared equally between the First Nations Fisheries Council and the Pacific Salmon Foundation as they work to conserve and restore the fish.
“Salmon are so important to our people,” said Semá:th First Nation Chief Dalton Silver at the event marking B.C. Wild Salmon Day. “In the cultural ways of our people, we say that they are relations.
“I do believe we need to work to combine the science and the knowledge of our people together to try and ensure a better future for everyone, including the salmon.”
Silver encouraged the public to think of salmon as the “living beings” that they are, rather than a resource to be harvested and exploited. He said he hopes future generations will have the same opportunity to engage with the province’s wildlife as he has.
According to a statement from the ministry, “science, Indigenous knowledge and data will be used to actively advance habitat restoration and climate adaptation” for the wild salmon.
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The latest funding is on top of nearly $286 million in joint federal-provincial money earmarked for the B.C. Salmon Restoration and Innovation Fund over seven years.
Fisheries and Oceans Canada says many Pacific salmon stocks are declining to “historic lows” due to the impacts of climate change, habitat loss and other threats.
“The reality of some of our streams, our rivers going into extinction is something we do not want,” said John Henderson, vice-president of the First Nations Fisheries Council of B.C.
“We can’t do this alone. We have all kinds of rights and title issues. We need to set all those things aside and become one.”
The organization, added executive director Jordan Point, has a “proven record of tangible results” in salmon stewardship and the funding is a step forward for their efforts.
Shortly before that funding announcement took place, the First Nation Wild Salmon Alliance and Union of BC Indian Chiefs (UBCIC) hosted another event marking B.C. Wild Salmon Day.
They expressed deep concern with continued federal approval of some open-net fish farming operations in B.C., which can harm the health of wild populations through transmission of disease.
Dozens of licenses were renewed in the Discovery Islands last year as Ottawa drafts its framework for transitioning away from open-net fish farming. It’s currently in the third phase of that planning process.
Fifteen open-net Atlantic salmon farms in the same area were rejected this year, however, with federal Fisheries Minister Joyce Murray stating that Ottawa is taking a “highly precautionary” approach.
The First Nation Wild Salmon Alliance disagreed.
“Last year’s returns were 50 per cent below projected,” said the organization’s chair, Bob (Galagame’) Chamberlain, at the press conference.
“We’ve exercised our inherent rights to food fish since time immemorial, so we have a very heightened concern about the health and abundancy of wild salmon.”
Both the provincial and federal governments have ratified the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP), which Chamberlain said enshrines First Nations’ right to food security through its protection of Indigenous cultural practices, economic participation and land stewardship.
Shackan Indian Band Chief Arnie Lampreau said he knows of eight nations that have spent more than $800,000 buying fish from Alaska to supplement poor returns on the Fraser River and feed their people.
In a Thursday statement, UBCIC said wild salmon are in “an increasingly desperate state” and “drastic action” is needed to save the fish.
“First Nations have sounded the alarm on the state of wild salmon for decades and long identified the implications of government actions, allowing for even more degradation of salmon habitat and overfishing by industry,” its president, Grand Chief Stewart Phillip, said in the release.
— with files from The Canadian Press
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