Elusive SUMBAWS report central to salmon farming investigation

A scientific report (SUMBAWS) quoted by an Irish environmental group in a formal complaint to the European Commission on the potential impact of sea lice on wild salmon stocks in Ireland, has not been made readily available ― despite being partly publicly funded, and also of critical interest to the aquaculture sector.

The complaint by Salmon Watch Ireland in February 2009, which resulted in the EU Commission initiating a Pilot Investigation* lasting five years, makes several references to the SUMBAWS report.

SUMBAWS (Sustainable Management of Interactions between Aquaculture and Wild Salmonid Fish) was a project involving research on the impact of sea lice on wild salmonids by participants from Ireland, Scotland, Netherlands and Norway.

Industry search
Speaking to Inshore Ireland, IFA Aquaculture Executive Richie Flynn revealed his efforts to secure a copy of this part-publicly funded report:

These included two Freedom of Information Requests in 2009 and 2013 and a Public Access to Environmental Information Request in 2013 – all of which have been refused.

“SUMBAWS was a major component of Salmon Watch Ireland’s complaint to the EU Commission in early 2009. It was a significant so-called Shared Cost RTD (Research and Technological Development) project with a budget totalling €2,370,803 million.

“Of this, the EU contributed €1,615,787. The project ran from October 2002 to December 2005 – three-and-a-quarter years – so this was a major study.”

IFA Aquaculture’s first FoI submission specifically sought correspondence between the Central and Western Fisheries Boards and records of mortalities of fish used in the SUMBAWS Project.

“That was refused on the basis that some of the data in SUMBAWS was under peer-review at the time. But I was also informed that it would become available in late 2009-early 2010. That was the position of the Central Fisheries Board in June 2009.”

The IFA Aquaculture executive believes that Salmon Watch Ireland must have had a very detailed sighting of SUMBAWS, (declared unavailable) because they quoted from it in their complaint.

And he believes that only a very small group of people at that time had access to SUMBAWS.

Second FoI attempt

In September 2013, IFA Aquaculture made another attempt to get the report:

“We filed a request for the full report under Public Access to Environmental Information, to the Department of Communications Energy and Natural Resources and Inland Fisheries Ireland.”

IFI response:

‘We wish to inform you that due to the volume of material that’s required to be collated and reviewed in advance of determining your request, we were unable to reply to you within the one-month period’.

In November 2013, the fisheries board responded to IFA Aquaculture saying that because the Pilot investigation had been re-opened, ‘matters contained in the collected communications may be subject to an investigation by the Office of The Ombudsman. Therefore, we’ve made a decision to refuse your request’

“The Department [DCENR] also came back to us on exactly the same date – November 28 – and said the same thing: ‘Because the Pilot case has been re-opened, we cannot comply.’ So they refused us too.”

Decision appealed

IFA Aquaculture appealed the refusal and on January 28, received a further letter from the Department saying that the report referred to had been co-ordinated by the University of St Andrews in Scotland who had sent it to the European Commission.

‘This report was funded by European FP5…. And it [the SUMBAWS Report] is our understanding that it should be requested from the European Union’.

“They also told me the information requested was not held by or for the Department of Communications Energy and Natural Resources.

“In other words, are they are saying they didn’t have a copy of SUMBAWS?” Flynn asked.

Flynn revealed other attempts to obtain the SUMBAWS report – including a PQ on July 1, 2014 by Padhraic McLoughlin TD.

The NINA report
Meanwhile, in September 2014, IFI highlighted the publication by the Norwegian Institute for Nature Research (NINA) Report 1044, ‘Effects of salmon lice on sea trout – a literature review’ of what it claimed was a ‘definitive review’ of over 300 scientific publications on the effects sea lice can have on sea trout stocks, which was compiled by a team of top scientists from Ireland, Scotland and Norway.

Apart from a single note in the biographical details of one of NINA’s contributors, the SUMBAWS report is not included.

*Closure of EU Pilot for second time

The Pilot Investigation by the European Commission into the potential impact of sea lice on wild salmon stocks in Ireland concluded with the finding that the Irish State has no case to answer.

The investigation was launched in 2009 following complaints by Salmon Watch Ireland and Friends of the Irish Environment (FIE).

The case was initially closed in 2012 but was reopened later that year after FIE provided the Commission with additional information, including a report from Inland Fisheries Ireland.

Since its introduction in 2008 the EU Pilot has been a relatively quick and effective mechanism designed to provide answers to questions arising in the application of EU laws – particularly those raised by citizens or businesses.

The EU Commission closed its investigation in September and which was finally closed in September

Donal Maguire, BIM’s Director of Aquaculture Development Services welcomed the Commission finding saying it represented three things:

“First it shows that there was no evidence to support the suggestion that salmon in Irish rivers are being adversely affected by sea lice from salmon farms. Second, it is a clear demonstration that the EU Commission accepts the science, developed by the Marine Institute of Ireland, which shows that sea lice have only a very minor influence on wild salmon survival and third, the closure of the case upholds Ireland’s excellent sea lice monitoring and control programme on salmon farms, which commission officials have classified as being the ‘best in Europe”.

Mr Maguire said he hoped the move would be a ‘turning point in the long running and sometimes bitter debate about salmon farming and wild salmon stocks’.

FIE spokesperson Tony Lowes sees the decision as a demonstration of the limitations of EU environmental law.

He said that despite accepting that environmentalists had provided a number of studies demonstrating a link between salmon farms and wild salmon mortality the Commission could find no provision under EU law for a general ban on salmon farming.

“They are in fact limited in their powers to examining only salmon in rivers specifically listed for their protection. In this case, those cited by Salmon Watch Ireland – the Bundorragha river, the Newport river, and the Ballynahinch catchment have all maintained ‘reasonable conservation status’. Therefore the Commission had no grounds to proceed further to court,” he argued.

Mr Lowes pointed out that a review* of three hundred available papers on the effects of sea lice published in September confirmed that sea lice have ‘negatively impacted wild sea trout stocks in salmon farming areas in Ireland, Scotland and Norway‘

He said the review found that ‘sea lice have a potential significant and detrimental effect on marine survival of Atlantic salmon with potentially 12-44% fewer salmon spawning in salmon farming areas’.

“BIM’s statement welcoming the closure of the case in which they state that there is ‘no evidence to support the suggestion that salmon in Irish rivers are being adversely affected by sea lice from salmon farms’ is both unscientific and unsound, ’” Mr Lowes concluded.