Protest
On Saturday, October 7, a tractor trundled through the streets of downtown Reykjavík with hundreds of protestors in tow. The procession was headed to Austurvöllur Square in front of Iceland’s Parliament for a demonstration.
Several organisations – including Landvernd (the Icelandic Environment Association) and the Icelandic Wildlife Fund – had organised the event to protest salmon aquaculture in open-net sea pens, an industry that grew more than tenfold in Iceland between 2014 and 2021. During this period, annual production ballooned from nearly 4,000 tonnes of farmed salmon to approximately 45,000 tonnes. (In 2021, there were, on average, about 16 million farmed salmon in open-net pens around Iceland.)
Wild salmon hatch and mature in freshwater rivers before undergoing smoltification to adapt to the ocean, where they grow to adulthood. After several years at sea, they return to their birth rivers to spawn, completing their life cycle.
The reason protestors were demonstrating was because the growth of the industry had coincided with what some would call predictable problems. Aside from the potentially negative environmental impacts that salmon farming in open-net pens poses – including pollution from fish waste, uneaten feed, and chemicals or medicines used to treat diseases – Iceland had recently witnessed firsthand two of the industry’s primary risks: the escape of genetically-distinct farmed salmon of Norwegian origin from open-net pens (threatening introgression with wild populations), and the proliferation of diseases and parasites, most notably sea lice.
Conversations with God
Among those who took the stage on October 7 was producer, former journalist, and current board member of the Iceland Wildlife Fund, Inga Lind Karlsdóttir. A self-described advocate for animal welfare, Inga Lind confesses that October 7 was actually the first protest she had ever attended.
“If you had told me a few years ago that in 2023, I’d be standing on stage leading a demonstration, I would have laughed,” Inga Lind, sitting across from me at the Kaffibrennslan café in downtown Reykjavík, remarked. “But there’s just so much at stake. Entire ecosystems. Nature itself.”
The largest escape in the history of open-pen aquaculture in Iceland occurred in 2021 in Arnarfjörður when nearly 82,000 farmed salmon raised by Arnarlax went missing from a damaged pen. The Icelandic Food and Veterinary Authority fined Arnarlax ISK 120 million [$848,000, €780,000] for the escape and for providing incorrect information about the event during an investigation in 2022. This was the first time such a fine was imposed on a salmon farming company in Iceland.
During her youth, Inga Lind would accompany her father, a schoolteacher who enjoyed long summer vacations, to Þingvallavatn lake. Together, they enjoyed languid days of fishing. Years later, her husband introduced her to fly fishing, and there was no turning back. “I agree with [Icelandic musician] Bubbi: Fly fishing in a river is like having a private conversation with God,’” Inga Lind laughed.
It was in communion with her fellow anglers, many years ago, that she first became aware of the risks posed by aquaculture in open-net pens. She fears not only that the escape of farmed salmon from open-net pens – which she deems unavoidable – will weaken wild stocks (and worse) but that it will also harm the fly fishing industry.
“I’m already hearing concerned voices from foreign anglers. ‘Why should I pay to catch farmed salmon in Iceland?’ they ask. And you can’t forget that angling is a huge source of income for landowners, guides, outfitters, accommodation providers, and so on,” Inga Lind remarked.
A notable absentee
Among the estimated 3,000 people who attended the protest on Austurvöllur Square there was, perhaps, one notable absentee: Minister of Food, Agriculture, and Fisheries Svandís Svavarsdóttir. “I don’t know where she was,” Inga Lind recalled, “but it was good seeing the Minister for the Environment. Even though aquaculture does not fall directly within his purview, aside from matters of pollution, he took the time to attend and to receive our declaration, which goes to show that he cares; it gives us hope that he’ll use his power to advocate for the environment and ecosystems.”
Despite Svandís’ absence, Inga Lind has high expectations for the minister’s forthcoming bill, to be introduced to Parliament in January of next year. It will provide for harsher penalties for regulatory breaches, give institutions clear authority to revoke permits, and allow only one company to operate per fjord.
Inga Lind believes that an improved regulatory framework and harsher penalties are steps in the right direction. “Ultimately, however, we’d like to put an end to this industry – to drag the nets back on land – but we’re clear-eyed about the legal obstacles and hope the minister’s bill, if passed, will prove as effective as possible.”
While acknowledging that the aquaculture industry creates jobs in rural communities (0.3% of Iceland’s working population was employed in the aquaculture industry in 2022), Inga Lind believes that its economic impact is vastly overstated. “The business model is about scaling up: condensing production into large numbers of nets within the fjords, while employing as few people as possible. And the number of jobs doesn’t increase as these farms scale up.”
Also, the greater the number of nets, the greater the risk of sea lice.
“They’re slaughtering a million fish right now, as we speak,” Inga Lind continues. “For animal feed. Because the fish are in such miserable condition that they won’t survive the winter. Foreign ships are arriving to slaughter them. They’ll be shipped to Norway and processed into fish silage. What other food industry would accept such mortality rates? There are 60,000 wild salmon in Iceland – and we’re slaughtering a million farmed salmon right now.”
Deathly-white heads
On the day of my interview with Inga Lind, news outlet Heimildin published an article featuring drone footage that shed light on the severity of a sea lice outbreak in Tálknafjörður in the Westfjords.
The public had known of the outbreak since early September, but videos – showing half-eaten salmon with deathly-white heads languishing in pens operated by Arctic Fish (an Icelandic salmon farming company backed by the Norwegian juggernaut Mowi) – made abstractions more visceral.
The footage was shot by kayaker and environmental activist Veiga Grétarsdóttir. Veiga was in Tálknafjörður, about three kilometres from the pens, when she launched a drone and let it hover some 100 metres [330 feet] above Arctic Fish’s open-net pens. As she began to zoom into the lice and bacteria-infested salmon, she was shocked:
“I kept zooming in further and further. I just couldn’t stop filming, it was so horrific. I don’t remember seeing a single healthy fish. I have never seen anything like it. There were fish swimming into each other, fish swimming against the pens, and then there were dead fish,” Veiga stated.
Sea lice are parasitic copepods, typically from species like Lepeophtheirus salmonis and Caligus elongatus. These tiny crustaceans attach themselves to the skin, fins, and gills of salmon, feeding on their mucus, blood, and skin. This can result in significant harm to the fish, including reduced growth, increased susceptibility to diseases, and in severe cases, death.
Heimildin also spoke to Karl Steinar Óskarsson, Head of the Aquaculture Department at the Icelandic Food and Veterinary Authority (MAST), who affirmed that “no one” had seen a sea lice infestation spread like this before: “We’re going to propose measures to ensure that this does not happen again. Among them is that salmon farming companies acquire better equipment to respond to sea lice in case of an outbreak,” he noted.
The sea lice also affected the fish pens of Arnarlax (an Icelandic company backed by Norwegian SalMar) in Tálknafjörður, although to a lesser degree.
Teitur Björn
Teitur Björn Einarsson is 43 years old and a member of Parliament for the Independence Party in the Northwest constituency. He was raised in Flateyri in the Westfjords. During his teens, he spent a summer aboard a longline fishing vessel and another summer employed in a fish-freezing factory.
“I belong to that generation that experienced the strengthening of small fishing villages during the ’80s, when you had growth within the fishing industry, investment in ships, and so on,” Teitur remarked, sitting in the same coffeehouse where I had recently spoken with Inga Lind. “But I also witnessed the decline in the ’90s, during a period of high inflation when banks closed off lending lines and companies were forced to merge or sell their quota.”
This had serious consequences.
“It impacted not just Flateyri but the entire Westfjords,” Teitur continued. “People moved away from small villages as well as bigger coastal towns like Ísafjörður. Thankfully, in the early 2000s, companies recovered, and the small boat fishing industry expanded through the efforts of fishermen.”
The Westfjords began experimenting with aquaculture in open-net pens in the late 2000s.
“About 10 or 15 years ago, we saw evidence that aquaculture in open-net pens was both profitable and viable,” Teitur observed. “Since then, there has been steady development bolstered by investments from Norway. Today, we’re witnessing quick progress, great opportunity, and more jobs. This has completely changed aquaculture in the Westfjords where it’s on par with the fishing industry.”
Teitur admitted, however, that the industry was not without its challenges.
“It’s clear to everyone, and to me, that this industry is problematic. Business-wise, the production time is long, three years from hatch to slaughter.” He also noted that aquaculture in open-net pens, similar to other agricultural industries, faces inherent risk factors, such as diseases, environmental impacts, biological waste, and animal welfare issues.
The industry’s reputation, Teitur further acknowledged, had recently suffered two significant setbacks, the aforementioned outbreak of sea lice in Tálknafjörður and a recent escape of farmed salmon in Patreksfjörður.
The great escape
On August 20, approximately 3,500 farm-raised salmon escaped through two holes on an open-pen fish farm operated by Arctic Fish in Patreksfjörður, a fjord in Iceland’s Westfjords. (For comparison, this represents some 6% of Iceland’s wild salmon population.) Arctic Fish had not inspected the condition of the pens for 95 days.
In early September, the Icelandic Food and Veterinary Authority (MAST), confirmed that 26 farmed salmon traced to the escape in Patreksfjörður had been caught in several fishing rivers in West and North Iceland. By October, the Federation of Icelandic River Owners claimed that 344 farmed salmon had been captured in 46 different locations. Later reports indicated that six rivers contained upwards of 20 salmon, most of which (54) in the Blanda River, located about 270 kilometres from the fish farm in Patreksfjörður.
In response to the escape, the Directorate of Fisheries announced that it would provisionally extend the angling season until mid-November to increase the chances of farmed salmon being caught. Additionally, teams of Norwegian divers were dispatched to aid in the capture of the escaped fish.
Anthropogenic threats
The escape in Patreksfjörður prompted renewed concerns about the potential for farm-raised salmon introgressing (genetically mixing and hybridising) with the genetically distinct wild salmon in Iceland. Such escapes have long been a concern in Norway, where open-pen fish farms have a much longer history.
In a 2023 report from the Norwegian Scientific Advisory Committee for Atlantic Salmon, the authors wrote that “both the number of Atlantic salmon returning from the ocean to Norway for spawning, and the Atlantic salmon catches, were among the lowest ever recorded in 2022 (decreased to less than half of what it was in 1980).” Despite this decline, the number of salmon spawning in rivers has risen, which the committee attributes to reduced fishing in both the sea and rivers.
The declining rate of sea survival among the Atlantic salmon is a complex phenomenon influenced by a variety of factors, such as the impact of human activities; climate change (Atlantic salmon prefer cooler waters); overfishing of certain species, causing disruptions to ecosystems; pollution; diseases; and parasites.
According to the report, salmon farming poses a significant risk to the wild salmon population in Norway: “The largest population declines are seen in western and middle Norway, and negative impacts of salmon farming have contributed to this. Salmon lice, escaped farmed salmon, and infections related to salmon farming are the greatest anthropogenic threats to Norwegian wild salmon.”
Indeed, because the state of the wild salmon population in western Norway is under threat, aquaculture is currently being scaled back in the area.
Best practices
Despite his optimism for the future of the industry, Teitur Björn is concerned about large-scale escapes like that which occurred in Patreksfjörður.
“These events have proven hugely traumatic for the industry. The Patreksfjörður escape was a shock to both the company involved and the local community, which has high hopes for the industry. It’s troubling that rules weren’t followed. Additionally, the processes intended to induce triploidy (infertility) in the farmed salmon failed, resulting in sexually mature salmon swimming in much greater numbers than expected into various rivers in North Iceland.”
When asked if it wasn’t reasonable to conclude that the threat posed by open-pen aquaculture to wild salmon in Norway (as outlined in the aforementioned report) was equally great in Iceland, Teitur Björn disagreed.
“First of all, regarding the decline of the Atlantic salmon stock: If you look back 50-60 years, that trend began long before the growth of the aquaculture industry. The same holds true in Scotland, Newfoundland, Alaska. The timeline doesn’t fit.”
Those who oppose aquaculture in open-net pens, however, are inclined to argue – as biologist Jóhannes Sturlaugsson did, in an interview on the radio programme Sprengisandur in early November – that introducing additional risks to an already vulnerable population is not the most prudent way to proceed.
“Norway has a much longer history with this industry,” Teitur continued. “They may have made mistakes. In Iceland, on the other hand, we’re adopting the best practices from Norway over the past 10 years, not only in terms of operations but legislation and regulation as well.”
These best practices, according to Teitur, include maintaining distance between fish pens and salmon rivers; implementing strong regulations, strict equipment standards, and supervision; and conducting risk assessments based on scientific models. Many of these measures are outlined in Minister Svandís Svavarsdóttir’s proposed bill.
Regarding the risk of introgression, Teitur – echoing an argument that has been made by Ólafur Sigurgeirsson, Assistant Professor at the Department of Aquaculture and Fish Biology at Hólar University – maintained that there was no scientific evidence that a population of domestic animals, bred for certain traits that made them less fit in the wild, had ever supplanted a wild population or greatly damaged it.
“You need a lot of farmed salmon to swim into rivers over a very long time so that there is a danger of introgression affecting the wild population,” Teitur claimed. “A few farmed salmon can swim upriver and reproduce but it doesn’t have an impact. The fifteenth generation of farmed salmon, which has evolved traits like rapid growth, has diminished survival ability in the wild. Their offspring have almost no chance of survival. That’s natural selection, which is irreversible.”
And yet some farmed salmon, and their hybrid offspring, do, at times, survive.
Leó Alexander
Leó Alexander Guðmundsson is a biologist at the Marine and Freshwater Research Institute. He’s written several research articles on aquaculture, including some on the hybridisation between wild Icelandic salmon and farmed salmon of Norwegian origin.
When asked about the threat that introgression poses to the wild salmon population in Iceland, Leó begins by noting that the Icelandic salmon population is not homogenous. Native to Iceland ever since the glaciers retreated during the end of the last ice age (about 10,000 years ago), Icelandic salmon is uniquely adapted to its environment. It exhibits distinct genetic structuring, with notable differences between the salmon in South Iceland and those in other regions.
There are, in fact, two distinct genetic groups of Icelandic salmon, with a mixing zone between those groups around Borgarfjörður in West Iceland. Genetic variation is also observed among populations within groups.
“Some populations belong to a single river, others to a system of rivers”, Leó continues. “So when we’re talking about the risk of introgression, that risk needs to be framed in terms of specific populations. Certain local populations, particularly smaller ones close to aquaculture facilities, exhibit increased vulnerability to genetic disruption,” Leó observes.
Aside from the risk posed by introgression, farmed salmon and hybrids compete with wild salmon for space and resources in rivers. If mature fish-farm escapees migrate into rivers and spawn, their offspring are in direct competition with the wild salmon, most notably at the fry and parr stage – even if their smolts don’t return to those rivers.
As Leó notes, farmed salmon and hybrid juveniles grow faster and are more aggressive than wild salmon, which makes them highly competitive.
Natural selection
While Leó agrees that a consensus exists among scientists that natural selection disadvantages hybrid salmon, the matter is more complicated.
“While natural selection often acts against hybrid offspring, the extent and consistency of this selective pressure are not fully understood,” Léó explains. “Not all hybrids die out. They manage to produce a second generation of hybrids. Our report from last summer shows this. There are hybrids that survive and spawn, so saying that nature selects against all these animals is not what we’re seeing.”
As Leó points out, first-generation hybrids possess a 50-50 genetic mix from farmed and wild salmon parents. And if that hybrid mates with a wild salmon, the DNA is 25% farmed salmon and 75% wild salmon. Then 12.5%, and so on. But if new genetic material from farmed salmon consistently enters the gene pool, the original genes thin out.
“It certainly may be the case that it can take a long time for wild populations to be completely composed of hybrids, especially when it comes to large populations far away from farms. But if we’re talking about smaller populations near farms, it may happen much faster. Not decades, but years. And it’s also a question of biological diversity. If farmed salmon continue to breed with wild salmon, it will represent a persistent intervention in the genetic makeup of these populations, with long-term effects on important biological traits.”
Regarding the discussion about wild salmon populations “dying out” due to hybridisation, Leó observes: “When there’s hybridisation within a population, the wild population has effectively been altered. It’s not that salmon has stopped swimming up rivers, but that a certain genetic resource, and a certain kind of biological diversity, no longer exists.”
The unique genetic composition of the wild Icelandic salmon, adapted over thousands of years to the specific conditions of their native environment, is in threat of being diluted or altered due to the introduction of genes from farmed salmon in the event of continued escapes. Consequently, the variety of genetic traits specific to the wild salmon population is being altered or even lost. These changes can have long-term consequences for the adaptability, health, and stock sizes of wild salmon populations.
The bottom line, according to Leó, is that Icelandic salmon has a distinct evolutionary lineage: “And it’s this genetic diversity that’s at risk due to hybridisation with non-native farmed salmon. It’s not that salmon in Iceland will become extinct in the sense that salmon will stop swimming into rivers – but that we’re permanently altering their gene pool.”
Unfortunately so
During the conclusion of an interview on the programme Dagmál in late October, Guðni Guðbergsson – Senior Division Manager at the Marine and Freshwater Research Institute – was asked by host Eggert Skúlason to comment on the “seriousness” of the threat of aquaculture in open-net pens. After a brief pause and some hesitation, Guðni replied: “Let’s just say that I don’t know – and that only time will tell. The whole picture hasn’t emerged yet, and it will probably be some time before it does.”
Then, both Eggert and Guðni simultaneously remarked:
“Unfortunately so.”
