The Washington State Board of Natural Resources has voted to ban commercial net pen finfish farming in Washington state-owned waters. The ban applies to commercial aquaculture operations in containers but not those used for raising fish for tribal ceremonial purposes or for open-water release.
In 2022, State Commissioner of Public Lands Hilary Franz issued an executive order to stop the practice after having canceled leases with Cooke Aquaculture. In 2017, a collapse of Cooke’s pens released about 250,000 nonnative Atlantic salmon into the water. After this incident, the legislature passed a bill preventing the Department of Natural Resources from approving any new leases for nonnative marine finfish aquaculture.
Alaska, Oregon and California have banned net pen finfish farming and Canada announced open-water salmon net pen aquaculture will be banned by mid-2029.
The board voted 4-2 in favor of the ban with two hours of public commentary. David Troutt Natural Resources Director for the Nisqually Indian Tribe said that tribe supports the prohibition.
“We are in a crisis mode in Puget Sound,” he said. “We have (Endangered Species Act) ESA-listed species in every system in Puget Sound and none of these stocks, with the exception of a handful, are moving towards recovery. So we need to be taking significant actions to move them in the right direction. These net pens present a significant risk to native fishes and the native communities dependent upon those fish with no benefit to those impacted.”
“The Nisqually Tribe’s Treaty rights are dependent on increasing salmon survival in the Salish Sea and removing risk…. In our opinion, this is an easy decision to reduce the risk that we do control and to allow us to maximize the benefits of our significant salmon recovery investments by removing this health risk to these native stocks.”
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