“It’s Frankenfish,” says Charlie Sark, a member of the Mi’kmaq First Nations and professor in the school of climate change and adaptation at the University of P.E.I. īut others have a wildly different view of the AquaBounty salmon, grown with technology called AquAdvantage, a name that would be at home on the pages of a dystopian Margaret Atwood novel.
“And that’s why we believe in using science and technology to help solve global problems, like food scarcity and climate change.”ĪquaBounty markets the salmon as disease- and antibiotic-free, saying its product comes with a reduced carbon footprint and no risk of pollution of marine ecosystems compared to traditional sea-cage farming. “W e believe savouring your favourite fish and helping save the planet should be one and the same,” the company’s website says. Unlike the European Union and the United States, Canada does not require GMO foods to be labelled - and the fast-growing fish are no exception.ĪquaBounty Technologies, the U.S.-based biotechnology company pioneering the genetically engineered salmon, says it is “combining the goodness of nature with the power of science and technology.” Yet Canadians munching on salmon tacos or salmon au gratin won’t have a clue they are eating the world’s first genetically modified food animal. When the salmon are harvested early in the new year, they will be shipped to seafood distributors, finding their way to restaurants, hotels, hospitals and grocery stores. But hidden in their DNA is a growth hormone gene from chinook salmon - spliced into genetic coding from ocean pout, an eel-like fish - that allows them to grow to full size at twice the speed. Grown in a land-based containment system, they look like any other Atlantic salmon: silvery, pale-bellied and speckled on top. On Prince Edward Island, anchored between Rollo Bay and a sea of potato fields, the first genetically engineered salmon raised in Canada for food are swimming in tanks. This is the second part of The Narwhal’s three-part series on the future of sustainable salmon.
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