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Toxic News:
The Forces Behind The Attempt To ‘Get’ Salmon Farming Paul F. Stifflemire, Jr.,
Director of The Media Research Center’s Business & Media Institute The American news media has been used again. An outfit called the
Environmental Working Group issued a press release dated July 30
that began: WASHINGTON -- The Environmental Working Group (EWG) today released
results of the most extensive tests to date of cancer-causing
polychlorinated biphenyl (PCBs) levels in farmed salmon consumed in
the United States. EWG bought the salmon from local grocery stores
and found seven of 10 fish were so contaminated with PCBs that they
raise cancer-risk concerns, relative to health standards of the US
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Journalists across the country covered the “story” with articles
that were, for the most part, little more than edited versions of
the EWG press release. Reuters “Health and Science Correspondent”
Maggie Fox began her story this way: Farmed salmon, which Americans are scarfing down because it is
supposed to be healthy, may actually be carrying high levels of
cancer-causing chemicals called PCBs, an environmental group said on
Wednesday. The majority of news stories provided little, if any information on
the background or credentials of EWG, and there was no critical
analysis of the study. News outlets relying on Reuters’ Fox might
just as well have reprinted the EWG press release. Her “story” was
comprised nearly entirely of quotes and data taken verbatim from
EWG’s copy and conveyed that organization’s message quite clearly:
farmed salmon poses a distinct health risk and the FDA is asleep at
the switch. And that message: “beware farmed salmon” was echoed in the vast
majority of news coverage. The Real Story But the real news is that journalists are asleep at the switch, and
under the influence of environmental credulity and anti-business
bias. Claims that farmed salmon contain PCBs are more than a year
old. In May 1992 the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) ran a
story about a Vancouver geneticist’s suggestion that farmed salmon
raised in British Columbia had “raised levels” of PCBs. That report
was, like the EWG study, billed as a “first ever” look at
“contaminants in farmed fish.” It was picked up by other news
outlets, including USA Today, which ran an editorial in October 2002
by Nick Jans, entitled “Farmed salmon can’t beat wild.” Jans is “an
Alaskan and a member of USA Today’s Board of Contributors.” He is
also an advocate with an agenda, as he makes clear in his editorial: Meanwhile, the salmon-farming industry continues to expand, notably
in British Columbia, literally on the doorstep of Alaska, home to
our last huge runs of wild salmon. Alaskan fishermen continue to go
bankrupt, processing plants close and workers go on welfare.
Wild Alaska salmon remains one of the last abundant, relatively pure
and wild foods available. Why on earth should we weaken our economy
and threaten a precious natural resource - all so we can eat an
imported, inferior substitute? In fact, the first notice of Dr. Easton’s “pilot study” appears to
have been in January, 2001, when the BBC NEWS Sci/Tech section
reported that his “study” had caused UK scientists to urge further
research into the safety of farmed salmon. However, between 2001 and
the 2002 stories and editorials and certainly well before the
release of the EWG study, Dr. Easton’s work had been thoroughly
dismissed as unscientific, and unreliable in terms of being useful
in forming serious conclusions as to the safety of farmed salmon.[1]
Abusing The Term ‘Science’ None the less, as the salmon story continues to develop, Easton’s
study morphs into a “peer-reviewed” work touted by EWG and others.
Jans wrote in his editorial that Easton’s work “was published in the
peer-reviewed international science journal, Chemosphere….” In fact,
articles in Chemosphere are not necessarily peer-reviewed, nor is
Chemosphere itself “peer-reviewed.” The magazine’s publisher,
Elsevior, describes it this way: Chemosphere is an international journal designed for the rapid
publication of original communications as well as review articles.
Chemosphere, as a multidisciplinary journal, offers maximum
dissemination of investigations related to all aspects of
environmental science. Chemosphere will publish:
- Original communications describing important new discoveries or
further developments in important fields of investigation related to
the environment and human health
- Reviews, mainly of new developing areas of environmental science
- Special, themed issues on relevant topics.
True peer-review is defined this way: “…a process that includes an
independent assessment of the technical or scientific merit of
research ‘by peers who are scientists with knowledge and expertise
equal to that of the researchers whose work they review’."[2] The
only assertion that Easton’s work was “peer-reviewed,” came from the
study’s funding source, the David Suzuki Foundation, without any
substantiation whatever. However, the mere publication of the
article has miraculously transformed it into “peer-reviewed”
science. Easton himself admits that “at our client's discretion,
some client-sponsored projects have also been reported in the
popular press.” He distinguishes between “independent research” he
conducts, and “client sponsored projects” such as his salmon work
bought by the Suzuki foundation. EWG made special note of the fact that its results “track previous
studies of farmed salmon contamination....” Journalists, ever
credulous, took EWG’s word for it that there were, indeed, previous
“peer-reviewed” studies, and that, somehow, that possibility
accorded EWG's “findings” instant credibility. Inescapable Conclusions Pursuit of the facts leads to several inescapable conclusions,
however. First: the media simply did not do its job. Second, much of
the news media appears to have become captive to the agenda of
extreme environmentalism and has, in this case, been a pliable tool
in an effort, described by the International Foundation for the
Conservation of Natural Resources as: “[an] NGO-orchestrated
campaign against farmed salmon [and] a move to eliminate certain
seafood items (and other agricultural commodities) from consumer
choices at retail outlets and seafood restaurants. It appears also
to be the introductory step prior to a major push by NGOs to assume
the role of monitor over product procurement over seafood and the
entire food industry.”[3] Third: we agree that the effort to “get” salmon farming is part of
a larger effort aimed at “Big Food,” an industry held in the same
contempt by those involved as “Big Tobacco,” and about to be
subjected to the same, virulent onslaught. What is at stake in this
fight is the very concept of economic freedom and the very free
market system that has served to make America the most prosperous
nation on earth. The stakes are indeed high. Salmon Farming Under Attack Perhaps if salmon farming were less successful, it wouldn’t have so
many enemies today. But it has been amazingly successful, achieving
the efficient production of a quality, desirable product far beyond
what anyone believed possible at the industry’s beginnings. And it
appears that has earned the salmon farming industry a number of
enemies. A Free Market Success Story Between 1981 and 1998, a remarkable transformation took place. The
principal supply source of salmon brought to market went from wild
caught salmon to farmed salmon. In 1981 the total farmed salmon
weighed a mere 12,000 tons, versus a wild catch weight totaling
620,000 tons. By 1998, farmed salmon production had surpassed the
output of the world’s fishing fleets, and in 1999 farmed salmon
output stood at 1,010,000 tons, more than 24 percent greater than
the 812,000 tons caught “in the wild.”[4] And forecasters suggest that the future looks even brighter for
aquaculture, the name for the practice also known as “fish farming”
and criticized by its opponents as producing “factory fish.” In
Chile alone farmed salmon production could quadruple in the next
decade to 654,000 tons, according to Rodrigo Infante, general
manager of the Association of Chilean Salmon and Trout Farmers. By
2010, farming could provide 84 percent of the world's salmon, 2.3
million metric tons.[5] And this is precisely how the free market
works. Entrepreneurs recognize a real need, and devise the means to
efficiently and profitably meet that need. In the case of salmon and
other fish farming, the benefits to humanity are manifold. We have
heard the stories of the depletion of the world’s supplies of wild
fish, due to over-fishing and over-consumption. We have been warned
by environmentalists that we are coming dangerously close to
eliminating certain species of fish; yet, at the same time we are
told by scientists of the benefits of consuming fish. And, it is
recognized that meeting the demands of a growing world population
will require ever more of them. Thus the application of mass
production methods by fish farmers has produced an abundant and
relatively inexpensive supply of fish, and appears to hold the
promise of meeting the world’s growing demand. But it is this very success, and the expectation of significant
industry growth and profits, that have served to attract the
attention of powerful interest groups. At a minimum, these groups
can be characterized as less than sanguine regarding the benevolence
of private industry, especially industry with a global reach. At the
extreme, they are anti-capitalist and not beyond sabotage to advance
their agendas. Media Find Junk Science Credible Salmon farming has been thrust into the spotlight again following
the issue of a report by the Environmental Working Group (EWG)
claiming that samples taken from 10 farmed salmon purchased in
supermarkets were found to contain what the EWG called “high levels
of cancer-causing PCBs.” The report went on to advise that, despite
the fact that the claimed levels of PCBs were substantially below
what the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) deems safe, consumers
should significantly reduce their consumption of farmed salmon. Our review of media coverage found that the EWG report received
national coverage and was accorded credibility by all outlets.
Typical was the story appearing in the Washington Post, which began:
“A sharp rise in the consumption of farmed salmon may be posing a
health threat to millions of Americans because of high levels of
PCBs that have been found in limited samples of the popular fish,
according to a study released yesterday.”[6] Most news outlets, like the Post, treated the EWG claims with total
credulity. The New York Times reported the EWG assertion that the
fish samples studied contained PCBs “at an average level far higher
than any other protein source, including all other seafood.” Then
the Times, while noting that the EWG report was not “peer reviewed,”
meaning it had not been subjected to the level of scrutiny required
to consider its findings or conclusions scientifically credible,
informed its readers that “two previous peer-reviewed studies of
farmed salmon found similarly high levels of PCBs.” We have found,
however, that the two studies being referred to are not, in fact
peer reviewed.[7] A number of reports contained the identical sentence: “Responding to
the recent findings, Dr. Terry Troxell, a toxicologist in the FDA
center for food safety and applied nutrition, said, "Any time we
have a standard that goes back to the '70s and '80s, it's time to
review it." It appeared in the Times, the Arizona Daily Star, the
Seattle Post-Intelligencer (where the story was carried above the
fold on page one). But these newspapers failed to include this statement by Troxell:
"Based on everything we know about PCB in salmon, the FDA maintains
its current advice to consumers to not alter their consumption of
salmon or other fish, which is highly nutritious." And the
newspapers that did carry Troxell’s endorsement of continued salmon
consumption placed it at or near the end of the story. By far the
worst reporting was done by Maggie Fox, “Health and Science
Correspondent” for Reuters. Her story simply repeated verbatim the
claims of EWG, did not contain a single rebuttal or comment from the
salmon farming industry or scientists expressing skepticism
regarding EWG’s position, and left the reader with the clear
impression that farmed salmon is “contaminated with high levels of
polychlorinated biphenyls.” CNN Fuels Panic The worst offender in terms of television coverage was CNN. Soledad
O'Brien of CNN began her piece: “Americans love their salmon. Only
tuna and shrimp are more popular on the seafood menu, and much of
the salmon we eat is farm raised. But a new study suggests that the
fish might actually be a very unhealthy choice….This is really scary
stuff actually.” And, she went on: “There are many people who are going ahead and
actually eating farmed salmon, because they thought maybe the wild
salmon would have mercury in it, which is another problem as well.
And anybody, certainly when you're pregnant, they tell you avoid
eating salmon, and so we thought farm salmon might be a better
choice. It seems significantly worse.” In two sentences the CNN anchor managed to announce that “fish
might actually be a very unhealthy choice,” and after introducing
mercury, a topic that EWG hadn’t even broached in its report, state
that “farm salmon” seems “significantly worse” than even
mercury-tainted fish. But who can blame a mere news anchor for being
confused when her “expert advisor” Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN Medical
Correspondent, is apparently confused as well? The following exchange occurred as O’Brien attempted to get to the
heart of the matter: O'BRIEN: “As with many medical stories, you watch this, you say,
OK, I love fish, I like to eat fish. What's the take-away? Don't eat
fish? Don't eat as much fish? Only eat the wild fish and not the
farm fish? Stick to some other kind of fish altogether, rather than
salmon, even with the whole idea that the Omega III fatty acids are
more prevalent in salmon? What do you do?” GUPTA: “Well, here's the thing, fish is still a very healthy food.
Wild fish probably is going to have some of those attributes and
maybe a little higher in protein and things than the farmed salmon.
I think people agree on that. For the most part, you're getting
these Omega III fatty acids in any sort of fish you eat there,
especially the salmon, and that's going to be good for you, good for
your heart. With regards to the PCBs, it's one of those things where, yes, the
levels are higher in certain kinds of fish. Is that level going to
be too much? The FDA says no. They say don't worry about this. The
increase in your cancer risk is so low, so minimal, you're probably
not going to need to worry about it.” After that exchange, the audience is left frightened and confused,
and certainly not sure whether salmon, or any fish for that matter,
is safe for consumption. Media Support Anti Capitalists In fact, the media, in reporting on the EWG “study” performed just
as the enemies of farmed salmon knew they would. Unable to
distinguish between good science and bad, newspapers and television
news reporters defaulted to their bias. That, of course, is toward
the EWG, as an organization with the “public interest” at heart and
against the suspect industry, in this case salmon farmers, as
motivated primarily by profit.[8] However, wouldn’t the media be prudent to at least examine the
motives of the EWG? EWG states that it is “a not-for-profit environmental research
organization dedicated to improving public health and protecting the
environment by reducing pollution in air, water and food.” EWG also
notes that it “is funded almost exclusively by grants from
foundations. These grants vary in size and are usually one or two
years in term. Major supporters past and present include the W.
Alton Jones Foundation, the Joyce Foundation, the Pew Charitable
Trusts, the Beldon Fund, the Turner Foundation, and the Richard and
Rhoda Goldman Fund.”[9] Follow the Money The news media is always hypercritical of the results of research
funded by “corporate interests,” according them no credibility.
However, no thought was given to any possibility that EWG’s research
might be tainted by the influence of its funders. And just how
powerful and influential are the foundations that support EWG?
Suffice it to say that the six foundations listed above control a
total of more than $6.3 billion in financial assets. Together they
expend slightly more than $200 million in annual funding to further
their environmental agendas. That kind of money spells power and
influence.[10] The W. Alton Jones Foundation has provided $400,000 in funding to
EWG for the purpose of “promoting public and policymaker
understanding of the risks that pesticides and other contaminants
pose to children's health.” It simultaneously granted $300,000 to
the Environmental Media Services to “promote media understanding of
environmental threats to children's health using a rapid response
team to spotlight important, inaccurate or misleading news
coverage.” The Foundation is at the forefront of worldwide efforts
to promote what it calls its “Sustainable World Program,” a movement
that has emerged as anti-capitalist and anti-progress. Another
enterprise sponsored by the W. Alton Jones Foundation is the Society
of Environmental Journalists. SEJ claims to be interested in
fostering “impartial” reporting on the environment, but its
organizational impartiality can best be gauged by its president, Dan
Fagin, whose book “Toxic Deception” is nearly as revered by the
environmental movement as is Rachel Carson’s “Silent Spring.”
Perhaps Fagin’s book is more important, because it has helped
convince many that the private sector, motivated by profit, is
nearly totally disinterested in public or consumer safety. The Environmental Media Services (EMS) is certainly doing its part
to keep journalists well informed regarding the hazards of farmed
salmon. It maintains a primer on “Salmon Farming” at its website,
cataloging the litany of negative claims and charges against the
industry and advancing a list of “experts,” all of whom are
distinctly anti salmon farming. And, of course, it served as a
principal facilitator for the dissemination of EWG’s press release
on its “First Ever U.S. Test of Farmed Salmon.” Foundations Purchase Desired Results The Joyce Foundation makes no bones regarding its aggressive
funding of groups to promote “agricultural reform,” including
aquaculture, in a manner that quite clearly demonstrates a bias in
favor of financing those organizations already predisposed to “find”
contamination in the environment requiring draconian regulation and
restriction of industrial activity. One of the Joyce Foundation’s
proudest achievements is their partial funding of the book, “Our
Stolen Future,” a polemic that was roundly pilloried as absurd, but
none the less has helped environmentalists advance the agenda of
“lingering” chemicals, notably PCBs, wreaking havoc on the
environment and our health. The Pew Charitable Trusts are very active in advancing the
anti-capitalist environmental agenda, contributing almost $40
million to “environmental causes” in 2002. Pew’s funded research
fellows produce such blinding insight as the following: “Fishing has
changed the oceans more than any other human activity. And most
ordinary people directly affect the oceans by eating seafood.
Solutions will have to come from increased democratization,
spreading decision-making across communities, and involving
scientists, economists, and conservationists in addition to fishing
industry representatives.”[11] Pew funded researchers have advanced
such mind-boggling claims as the assertion that “only 10 percent of
all large fish…are left in the sea.”[12] Clearly, Pew and its allies
see the private sector as anti-environment, and the only means to
environmental salvation is through “democratization”—read:
socialism. We have to wonder why no one questions the possibility of
“undue influence” by an organization that not only funds
environmental research, but also funds National Public Radio—the
first broadcast media outlet to “cover” the EWG “study.” The Smoking Gun? ever, it is the Beldon Fund that provides the clearest evidence
of the reality of the agenda and the role of EWG. Beldon has given
EWG $400,000 to support its “Toxic Chemical Policy Project,” which
includes use of “body burden data and toxic tort organizing” to
reduce human exposure to toxic chemicals. EWG’s work is, as Beldon
puts it, to “provide research support for toxic tort litigation.” So
much for “objective” research; rather than belabor the point, it is
sufficient to say that neither the Turner Foundation nor the Richard
and Rhoda Goldman Fund are in the habit of funding organizations
that might produce research supporting any benefits of aquaculture
or “industrial” farming. All of EWG’s funders know precisely what their investment will buy,
“evidence” of industrial misdeeds and ammunition for the use of what
is now a worldwide movement against salmon and other fish farming. And there is evidence that the work against salmon farming financed
by the foundations has already made its way into “toxic tort
litigation.” Tort Lawyers Target Top Of The Food Chain In April 2003 a lawsuit was filed by a Seattle law firm, Smith &
Lowney, against
three of America’s largest grocery retailers. The claim, ostensibly,
is that the grocers “misled” consumers by failing to properly label
salmon fillets as “farmed” and containing “artificial coloring.”
However, as Tacoma News Tribune opined in an editorial:
“This [lawsuit] is reminiscent of the dairy lobby's efforts, many
years ago, to prevent margarine from being sold with yellow,
butter-like coloring. Those battles weren't about the color yellow;
they were about protecting the livelihoods of dairy farmers. Nor is the argument over astaxanthin and canthaxanthin really about
the color of farmed salmon. Those two compounds are considered
harmless by the Food and Drug Administration and are probably about
as safe as anything added to American food. Closely related to
beta-carotene, they are common in nature and appear to provide a
variety of health benefits. Found in creatures as varied as lobsters
and flamingoes, they give wild salmon their distinctive color. The lawsuit, then, isn't about consumer safety per se - it is about
stigmatizing farmed salmon.”[13]
The lawsuit certainly appears designed to reduce demand for farmed
salmon by punishing retailers of the product. The aggressive strike
against the retailers suggests that neither color nor labeling is at
the heart of the effort; rather the lawsuit is clearly designed to
damage salmon farming and advance the wild salmon fishing industry.
Smith & Lowney issued a press release that stated: “lack of labeling also misleads the public into thinking they're
buying wild salmon, avoiding the problems associated with
farm-raised salmon including:
- Contamination from antibiotics and exposure to pesticides and other
chemicals
- Risks to wild salmon and other aquatic species from disease and
parasites which escape from fish farm pens
- Misrepresentation of health benefits - according to the US
Department of Agriculture, farmed Atlantic salmon is over 200
percent higher in saturated fat than wild pink or chum salmon
- Impacts on marine ecosystems from fish farm pollution.”
Smith & Lowney goes on to state that the lawsuit is “designed to
protect millions of consumers who purchase farm-raised salmon from
the three chains, and call for:
- Damages for consumers, expected to exceed tens of millions of
dollars for each chain
- A court order requiring the chains to inform consumers that the
salmon are artificially colored
- Civil penalties for violation of various consumer protection
statutes.”
The law firm lists two individuals with indisputable anti-salmon
farming credentials, John Volpe from the University of Alberta, and
Anne Mosness, of the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy as
informational “contacts” regarding the lawsuit. Volpe is a leading
advocate of the proposition that, despite actual scientific evidence
to the contrary, salmon escaping from farms into the wild will
reproduce and lead to “an ecological disaster.” Ms. Mosness is a
longtime advocate of “wild” salmon and an opponent of salmon
farming. She is associated with the Institute for Agriculture and
Trade Policy (IATP), an organization dedicated to preventing any
further growth in what it calls “Factory Fish Farming.” In fact, a news release dated April 16, 2003 by industry wide
publisher IntraFish contained the following: “IntraFish learned yesterday that Anne Mosness of the Institute for
Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP) is considering bringing a class
action lawsuit against retailers and possibly state agencies, for
failing to comply with the federal regulation [on labeling]. Although the process is still in the preliminary stage, Mosness said
that a number of food safety groups have expressed interest in the
issue. “This is definitely a health issue. If they are negligent,
they need to be held to task.”
While the law firm has attempted to cover up the truth—namely that
the so-called “plaintiffs” have a self-serving agenda—the cat is out
of the bag. In fact, one of the listed “plaintiffs” in the lawsuits
is himself a practitioner of “environmental law.” Christopher Krupp,
who is listed as one of two plaintiffs against Krogers, is a staff
lawyer for the Western Land Exchange Project of Seattle, an
organization that opposes all exchanges of “public lands” that
facilitate private development. Clear Evidence Of The Conspiracy
Evidence of close coordination of this effort to “monkey wrench”
the salmon farming industry abounds, from the development of a
homogonous list of salmon farming “evils,” to the coordinated
support of the idea that wild salmon are superior in every way. What is under way is a transparent effort to reverse and
countermand the working of the free market. Consumers have responded
to the entrepreneurs in the salmon farming industry by purchasing
their high quality product. The growth of the industry occurred
without coercion, was in response to true consumer needs and
reflective of the free, informed choices of the public and absent
political interference is likely to continue to grow to meet the
world’s burgeoning food needs. Now, “activists’ unable to persuade
the public through legitimate information and education, and
competitors unable to offer comparable quality products as
abundantly or at equivalent prices are enlisting their most powerful
weapons. And those are the courts, where tort lawyers will attempt to exact
multi-million dollar penalties in order to destroy the economics of
the industry, and the regulatory authorities that organizations like
the Environmental Working Group hope to panic into enacting
draconian new regulations that will serve the same end. Those who doubt the deadly serious nature of this organized effort
need to absorb the following excerpt from the “Friends of Clayoquot
Sound”: SALMON FARMING MARKETS CAMPAIGN
Bought any fish that's farmed and dangerous lately? We sure hope not
. . . and that's the message we're taking to consumers, retailers
and chefs along the west coast of Canada and the US now that the
Farmed and Dangerous markets campaign is underway.
The Farmed and Dangerous campaign, spearheaded by Friends of
Clayoquot Sound, Living Oceans Society and the David Suzuki
Foundation, is a joint project of the Coastal Alliance for
Aquaculture Reform (CAAR) - a coalition of ten environmental and
First Nations groups that have been working together for the past
two years on developing and implementing a coordinated campaign to
stop open netcage salmon farming in BC's oceans.
The markets campaign is a key element of CAAR's multi-faceted work.
We're educating consumers, retailers and chefs about the
environmental and health issues associated with salmon farming, and
asking them to stop buying and selling this product until the salmon
farming industry makes the reforms necessary to address these issues
effectively. We're focusing particularly on the western US, where
it's estimated that approximately 75% of BC's farmed salmon is
consumed. The campaign is a hybrid of the forestry related markets
work that BC environmentalists are famous for, as well as similar
campaigns in the US dealing specifically with food related issues.
The Friends' role involves working with chefs and retailers to get
farmed salmon off of their menus and out of their stores. Ever seen
our bumperstickers? They read, "Friends don't let friends eat farmed
salmon." So far we're living up to this motto . . . already over 70
chefs and retailers have signed on in support of what we're asking.
Those who've signed on to date include white tablecloth chefs from
California to BC, two grocery chains in Seattle, and several smaller
retailers along the west coast. Now that the campaign is underway,
we're starting work with larger companies and we're optimistic that
more and more businesses will come to recognize why they too should
stop selling farmed salmon.[14]
Ultimately, Economic Freedom Is At Stake The campaign against farmed salmon includes the distribution of
“toxic news,” political and marketing campaigns like the one above,
lawsuits, and even the destruction of property as occurred last
December when the Forest Action Network “deconstructed” a salmon
farm’s fish hatchery. Just as the effort to “get” Big Tobacco started with a seemingly
unrelated series of disparate efforts designed to “warn” the public
and “educate” regarding the dangers of tobacco, and culminated in
the looting of hundreds of billions of dollars, so the effort has
begun against “Big Food.” The salmon farming industry may be just
one of several “coalmine canaries” warning us of what’s to come.
Both the food industry and its customers need to beware, stay
informed and engage in no less vigorous an effort than their
opponents. We are happy to join such a fight to protect economic
freedom, the free market and, frankly, our liberty. [1] Among the most vocal critics was Dr. Charles Santerre, Associate
Professor , Department of Foods and Nutrition Purdue University, who
took the unusual step of writing the editors of Chemosphere and
demanding that they “further review this manuscript and attempt to
clarify this situation with readers and reviewers.”
[2] From the American Educational Research Association
[3] From the IFCNR Fisheries Committee statement “EWG Assault on
Farmed Salmon Opens below Canada's Border” released August 4, 2003.
The World Bank defines NGOs as "private organizations that pursue
activities to relieve suffering, promote the interests of the poor,
protect the environment, provide basic social services, or undertake
community development" (Operational Directive 14.70). In wider
usage, the term NGO can be applied to any non-profit organization
which is independent from government. NGOs are typically value-based
organizations which depend, in whole or in part, on charitable
donations and voluntary service.
[4] Source: The SeaWeb Aquaculture Clearinghouse
[5] From “The Next Generation: Where the Global Seafood Industry is
Going” by Kristan Hutchison, Juneau Empire
[6] From “Report Suggests High PCB Levels In Farmed Salmon” By Eric
Pianin Washington Post Staff Writer Wednesday, July 30, 2003; Page
A02
[7] “The press releases are based on two bodies of information: one
report by Miriam Jacobs, University of Surrey, which is actually a,
non-peer reviewed extended abstract presented at the "dioxin
conference 2000 in Monterey, CA, USA in august 2000 and published in
the meeting report series: Organohalogen Compounds, vol 47 (2000);
the other information is from Michael Easton, of the David Suzuki
Foundation, Canada, which is actually a non-published personal
communication. In both cases the number of samples analysed is very
low and thus would only allow a "snap-shot' type of information on
the state of contamination of the various salmon, at different
locations and of the fish feed.” This, according to Bram Brower,
Professor of Environmental Toxicology, Institute for Environmental
Studies, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam.
[8] Indeed, some news outlets even suggested that the FDA, in
setting its standards less strictly than the EPA, was unduly
influenced by its consideration of “economic factors,” leaving the
reader to infer that the EPA, in setting much stricter standards,
was correct in taking a “zero tolerance no matter what the cost”
approach, and that the FDA was compromising consumer safety in favor
of the salmon farming industry.
[9] From the Environmental Working Group Internet Website:
http://www.ewg.org/about.html
[10] From the foundations’ financial reports.
[11] Pew Fellow Carl Safina quoted in a Grantee Press Release by Pew
Fellows in Marine Conservation, entitled “Leading Experts Confirm
Immediate International Action Is Needed to Save World's Fisheries”
[12] According to findings of a Pew-funded study published in Nature
(May 15, 2003)
[13] From “Farmed salmon: Pink filets are not the issue” Published
April 25th, 2003, The News Tribune
[14] Much more information on the extent of the coordinated effort
to end salmon farming and those involved can be found at
http://www.focs.ca/1campaigns/1markets.html
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