Dr Rosalie Woodruff MP | Greens Environment spokesperson
The Greens share the concerns of coastal communities and conservationists about the Liberals’ Ten Year Salmon Plan. It’s a phoney consultation process on a plan that doesn’t propose the change needed to make the industry truly sustainable.
If the Liberals were listening to coastal communities and prioritising healthy public waters, they would be implementing the Legislative Council’s Fin-Fish Inquiry recommendations. The Upper House inquiry was truly consultative, and put forward reasonable regulatory changes.
To ensure Tasmania’s healthy waterways and community support for fish farms – essential in any decade-long salmon plan – the first priority must be an immediate transition from open net salmon farming in fragile inshore estuaries and bays.
The government’s draft plan also deliberately evades critical Fin-Fish Inquiry recommendations on biomass and nitrogen caps, along with requiring all salmon farm developments to be heard by the full Board of the EPA - with consultation and appeal rights. How is that listening to the community?
Tasmania’s waterways are at a perilous point. Without genuine community consultation and scientific engagement, the risk of coastal ecosystem collapse in the near future is high.
So furious is the community opposition to fish farming, there is already a mainland campaign advocating a boycott of Tasmanian salmon. The Liberals’ decision to only listen to industry will only sow further outrage and division.
Jeremy Rockliff should sit down and work on solutions with communities, not turn his back on them.