Environmental certification of the salmon industry in Chile demonstrates its poor environmental and sanitary standards

Ecoceanos demanded coherence from the ASC, since it has just announced that in the coming months it will again authorize the use of its “environmentally responsible” certification in salmon products of the questioned Norwegian-North American company Nova Austral in Magallanes region. This will occur at the exact same moment that the Chilean State has sued Nova Austral in court for serious crimes against Chilean environmental legislation, having falsified the environmental and health reports of its salmon farming centers in Magallanes region between 2016 and 2019.

Puerto Montt, August 21st, 2020 (radiodelmar.cl) — The Aquaculture Stewardship Council (ASC), the main international consultancy that provides health and social certifications to aquaculture companies around the world, revoked its seal to the farmed salmon from the Caicura culture center that the Blumar company maintained in the Reloncavi estuary, Los Lagos Region, where at the end of June more than 800 thousand specimens of this carnivorous species escaped. The measure is due to the fact that the ASC certification only allows a maximum of 300 escaped salmon per season in each salmon farm.

The ASC action was also taken after 35 local communities, indigenous people, social organizations and artisanal chilean fishermen, made the “Massive escape of salmon from Blumar company in the Reloncaví estuary: Citizen action to stop the destruction of our sea and defend the future of the coastal communities ” public statement.

In this document, they demanded that the Aquaculture Stewardship Council, linked to the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), not certify environmentally the “Caicura” farm, from whose facilities that housed 875,000 Atlantic salmon, a massive escape of fish occurred towards the vulnerable aquatic ecosystems of the southern region of Los Lagos.

According to ASC, the use of its logo helps companies «to enter new markets, and helps protect existing markets by maintaining buyer preference.» Furthermore, «the ASC logo adds value to seafood, throughout the entire supply chain.»

The ASC had granted the environmental certification CUP-C 865128-ASC-01-2019-SL to the salmon productions of Blumar S.A. company intended for export. In one of the clauses of this certification, valid until November 13, 2021, the use of the ASC logo was conditioned to the fact that there were no leaks into the aquatic environment that exceeded 300 salmon specimens per production cycle (Criterion 3.4. Escapes. ASC Salmon Standard. Version 1.3, July 2019).

The Aquaculture Stewardship Council has communicated the temporary revocation of its environmental certification to the “Caicura” salmon fattening center, after last June 28 an undetermined number of fish of this carnivorous species introduced into Chilean waters, escaped en masse in the area from the mouth of Reloncaví and the inland sea area of Chiloé.

“To guarantee our independence, ASC certification is audited and applied by separate bodies known as Conformity Assessment Bodies (CAB). The CAB in this case is Control Union Peru, which suspended the certificate of the Caicura center on July 3. While the suspension is in force, the product from that center cannot be sold as certified by ASC, ”said Blumar’s Commercial Manager, Daniel Montoya. This suspension is for 12 months, a period in which the salmon farm must undergo a full audit.

“To ensure minimal impact on the environment, no more than 300 fish can escape from an ASC certified farm in a production cycle, sites must make information about all releases public and use effective monitoring systems and precise, ”explains Montoya.

Centro Ecoceanos: «No + greenwashing» to salmon companies in Chile

Centro Ecoceanos values this first signal towards the fair demand of local communities, indigenous peoples and citizen organizations affected by four massive escapes of salmon occurred in the last eight months in southern Chile, a consequence of the accelerated expansion of the transnational industry of salmonids.

However, Eccoceanos demanded coherence from the ASC, since it has just announced that in the coming months it will again authorize the use of its “environmentally responsible” certification in salmon products of the questioned Norwegian-North American company Nova Austral in Magallanes region. This will occur at the exact same moment that the Chilean State has sued Nova Austral in court for serious crimes against Chilean environmental legislation, having falsified the environmental and health reports of its salmon farming centers in Magallanes region between 2016 and 2019.

The adulteration in the Nova Austral fish mortality data, caused anaerobic conditions (lack of dissolved oxygen in the water) under their salmon fattening centers, which they tried to hide, covering the seabed with tons of rock and sand.

In addition, the Chilean State Defense Council (CDE) filed a complaint (RIT O-150-2020) against the former executives of Nova Austral for the crime of fraud against the Treasury by falsifying information to obtain $ 60,000 million Chilean pesos in tax benefits and tax subsidies of Law No. 18,392.

See Ecoceanos Chilean Farmed Salmon Boykot Campaign : www.salmonquimicofuera.cl