Dr WOODRUFF (Franklin – Leader of the Greens) – Thank you, Honourable Speaker. Well, the bad news stories about the salmon industry unfortunately keep rolling in. We heard this week that four dolphins and five further fur seals died in salmon pens this year, and we know scores of cormorants have also died. It comes on the back of a summer of death in the marine environment.
In Tasmania, we saw salmon chunks washing up on southern beaches. In South Australia, the algal bloom has killed tens of thousands of animals from over 400 species so far. It is a natural disaster by any measure. Piscirickettsia salmonis disease was reported by the government to be in salmon pens last month, unprecedented in winter, and people are understandably anxious about what’s going to happen in this coming summer. Today, the Minister for Primary Industries and Water confirmed that multinational salmon companies have applied for an emergency use permit to use the unregulated antibiotic Florfenicol as a ‘preventative measure’ ahead of warming summer ocean temperatures, and they are supported hand in glove by the government staff in caretaker mode. However, like everything that the government is saying about salmon, the truth is murky.
We know that federal regulations managed by the Australian Pesticides and Veterinary Medicines Authority (APVMA) only allow emergency permits to be issued for a new antibiotic if there is a genuine emergency underway. Crossbenchers, myself included, received a briefing on 15 August and we were told there’s no emergency outbreak occurring. Today we heard that salmon mortality rates in pens have not crossed reporting thresholds. We also know salmon corporations have been in discussions with the government to get their hands on Florfenicol since at least March this year.
Is there an emergency? Not according to government staff. Or is, in fact, the so-called emergency application for a Florfenicol permit about dodging the normal assessment processes for unregulated antibiotics? What should happen is an approximately eight‑month long assessment of the risk to native fish and other aquatic life. On 13 August this year, the Acting Chief Veterinary Officer wrote a letter to the APVMA, supporting the salmon company’s emergency permit application for Florfenicol, noting it as ‘the antibiotic of choice’ for Chilean salmon companies treating Piscirickettsia salmonis.
How concerning it is for people who have been following the salmon industry in Tasmania to hear the government looking to Chile as a model for how Tasmania should respond to this disease. They are so far from world’s best practise. Chilean salmon farms use more than 400 tonnes of antibiotics a year to treat Piscirickettsia salmonis and other diseases. It’s an annual consumption of just under half a kilogram of antibiotics for every single tonne of salmon harvested. Even after dumping hundreds of tonnes a year, between half and 90 per cent of farmed salmon mortalities in Chile are caused still by Piscirickettsia salmonis. The science shows that there is a range of detrimental impacts from florfenicol, including increasing antibiotic resistance in bacteria, the spread of antimicrobial resistant genes, the effect on intestinal structures, gut microbiota, homeostasis, xenobiotic metabolism, antioxidant systems, and immune cell activity in crustaceans, tissue damage, metabolic disorders, and DNA damage to fish, damage to the mitochondria of cells and the protein synthesis and mitochondrial swelling, damage to embryonic development and liver toxicity in birds. We’ve got no idea about Tasmanian native species. That’s the point. They need to be assessed.
We’ve been told florfenicol is essential to prevent another salmon mortality event this summer but that is obviously false. The journal Frontiers in Immunology reports that the farming prevention that is required for Piscirickettsia salmonis is:
reduced stress in fish, lower stocking densities, avoiding transport and contact between farms, restricting the movement of well-boats, fish and people, screening brood stock and vaccinating the fish.
Without evidence otherwise, we can only assume that salmon companies have jumped straight to the use of an unregulated antibiotic so that they can continue to harvest diseased fish for sale and human consumption rather than risk any impact on their profits. We’ve long known that the salmon industry’s days in Tasmania are numbered. Their time is now, and the government must make sure there is a moratorium on intensification of the salmon industry, not just the spatial expansion they’ve talked about. We need to cease operations immediately in sheltered and sensitive areas.
Time expired.
