Rural Economy and Connectivity Committee

Meeting date: Wednesday, April 25, 2018

Official Report 553KB pdf

---

Salmon Farming

Our next item is on salmon farming in Scotland. I welcome Donald Cameron, who is the reporter for the Environment, Climate Change and Land Reform Committee on the salmon farming inquiry.

I invite members to declare any interests. I will start by declaring that I have an interest in a wild salmon fishery. I gave a full declaration at the start of the inquiry.

I repeat the declaration of interests that I made on 5 March in relation to a fish farm and a wild fishery.

This is our fourth evidence session in the committee’s inquiry. Last night, we had a useful videoconference with the Aquaculture Stewardship Council. Brief notes from that meeting will be made available and put on the website. It was an extremely informative meeting.

The committee is disappointed that we have not yet been able to identify any retailers of the product in Scotland who are prepared to give evidence in person. I am told that they are giving written evidence, but it is disappointing that they will not give evidence in person, despite our invitations to do so.

The committee will now take evidence from bodies that have an interest in the development of the farmed salmon sector. I welcome James Withers, chief executive of Scotland Food & Drink; Elaine Jamieson, head of food and drink at Highlands and Islands Enterprise; and Heather Jones, chief executive of the Scottish Aquaculture Innovation Centre.

The first question will be from John Finnie.

Thank you convener. I share your view of the retailers. No doubt they would quote a phrase that I read in our papers about

“pristine waters in visually dramatic Highland and Island loch settings.”

How important is Scotland’s natural environment to the market for Scottish farmed salmon?

It is critically important to all Scotland’s brand, not just the aquaculture industry. A large part of the growing market here and overseas is about Scotland’s broader provenance story, and there are a number of parts to that. It is about a mixture of heritage and tradition, but it is also about innovation, family businesses and environmental integrity. The only strong future for our aquaculture industry is in embracing world-class standards of environmental stewardship and animal welfare and husbandry. If we do not do that, we will not keep building the brand that has driven a doubling of food exports from Scotland in the past 10 years.

It is important to remember the context in which Scottish salmon goes to the global market. Compared to other farmed species, such as Ecuadorian shrimp, Vietnamese pangasius, Chinese carp and sea bass and sea bream from the Mediterranean, the quality of the provenance and the standards of environmental monitoring in Scotland are high. They are widely regarded by a number of other countries, including developed countries, as the best in the world. The New Zealand Government’s comparative study on environmental quality standards held up the Scottish regulatory system as one of the best.

10:15  

To look at it in a negative way, what would be the consequences of a failure to retain that position of quality connected with the environment?

We are dealing with a customer base that is different in different countries, but most of the countries that we are looking at as markets and our home market are increasingly environmentally conscious. They want to understand the regulatory system that sits behind the product. They might not want to go into the detail, but they want to have faith that our production systems work in harmony with the environment and enhance it where possible. Scotland’s growth in food and drink has been, in a large part, about building that reputation, so anything that has a detrimental impact on that would be hugely damaging. As Heather Jones said, the perception is that the quality of the product and the standards of production are extremely high.

I was interested by Heather Jones’s comment that Scotland’s reputation is very good. At last night’s videoconference with the ASC, we heard that it feels that Scotland is pretty poor in comparison with, say, Norway. We will come on to talk about sea lice later, but the ASC feels that Scotland is relying on things like the beautiful visual surroundings, as the quote John Finnie read out says, but the reality is that we are not as strict as South American countries, Canada, Norway and so on.

I am certainly surprised to hear that the ASC thinks that Chilean husbandry standards are higher than Scotland’s. Scotland is widely regarded as one of the most tightly regulated places in the world for salmon production. In relation to other species, salmon is the king of fish in the way that it is monitored and researched, and the environmental impact is a recognised factor.

Has that been approved by some third party internationally or is that just our opinion in Scotland?

It is certainly the opinion in a report written by the New Zealand Government that compared systems and found that the Scottish system is one of the strongest. Different systems have different strengths, but I have seen little evidence to suggest that Scotland is in a poor place.

The point that the ASC made last night was that some companies have certification through their schemes in other countries, such as Norway and Chile, and the very same companies operate in Scotland, but no farms in Scotland have the certification that those companies have for farms across the world.

There are a number of certification schemes. Certification bodies trade and market as a way of creating value for themselves and for their products.

I will pick up the point that has been made about the retailers with some of our contacts in our industry consortium. The UK retail market sets very high standards. M&S has plan A and all the major retailers specify fish health quality, water quality, stocking density and other things. The US and German retailers are starting to copy what is being established in the UK market. James Withers is right that consumers get a very high standard here.

I have a question for Elaine Jamieson on the importance of the issue to the rural economy. I am sure that the provenance of produce is important across the range, but specifically in relation to the issue that we are considering, does Highlands and Islands Enterprise have a view about that?

We look for sustainable growth across all our key sectors in Scotland, including tourism and food and drink. We look to the regulatory bodies and to Heather Jones and her friends in the science and academic community to lead the scientific work on positive environmental management and stewardship. From our point of view, we support businesses to be innovative in their practices and so lead to positive outcomes.

The tourism sector relies heavily on our natural environment. We have seen aquaculture—fin-fish farming in particular—and tourism grow significantly in recent years. I appreciate that not all environmental impacts are aesthetic, but the people who are appreciating our assets have not perceived any impact.

I have a comparatively small point for Heather Jones. It has been argued by some that Chile has better regulations than Scotland, but—it is a big but—the monitoring and implementation of those regulations are extremely poor. I am inviting you to agree that regulation is not everything. In particular, in Chile, the industry has been shut down for periods on several occasions because of the poor monitoring and management of health issues, even though, in theory, the regulations tell a different story. Is it fair to say that we have to look at the outcomes, rather than just what is in the legal framework?

Absolutely—that is a very good point. Chile has had multiple major health challenges, which have caused hundreds of thousands of fish losses because it has allowed untrammelled high-density and high-intensity growth. That has put pressure on the fish stocks, which leads to disease challenge and health risk and, as a result, all the fish die. Many of the Norwegian multinationals have been disinvesting from Chile because they are losing money and that is because the regulatory system does not work successfully.

If companies are to have confidence to invest in Scotland, they need to know that our regulatory system will be stable and quantified. Giving some certainty around the system can incentivise, or disincentivise, foreign direct investment.

I am keen to explore more about how the industry is certified in Scotland. As we heard last night, the ASC does not certify any fish farms in Scotland, as far as we are aware. What drives the certification system in Scotland? Is it driven by retailers?

I am not an expert on food certification systems. I know that the Scottish Salmon Producers Organisation uses an independent company called Acoura, which is headquartered in Edinburgh and which is one of the major certification bodies for marine standards for capture fisheries, salmon production and other food production.

Each retailer specifies in its contracts with suppliers minimum standards that have to be applied on withdrawal times for medicines, stocking density, the way in which the fish are brought to market and so on. Consumer pressure creates as much demand on producers as any other form of pressure, and that is funnelled through the retailers.

There is very little that I can add to that. Acoura delivers many of the quality assurance schemes for land farming, such as the Scotch beef and Scotch lamb quality assurance schemes and a scheme for a special type of pork. From that point of view, there are parallels between farming the land and farming the sea. As the committee is well aware—it is a shame that you do not have retailers in front of you to make this point—the regulatory demands that retailers make are complex and ever changing, and in most cases they go well beyond legal requirements.

I am pleased to hear that. I know that the retailers are pretty strict with their supply chains, whether that is for beef, pork, lamb or salmon. We are not clear what that process looks like or how it is driven, so a wee bit more detail would be useful to the committee.

I am not sure whether the SSPO has given evidence yet, but those who are directly involved in production and processing would be best placed to answer that. It is the same with wild catch fishing with the Marine Stewardship Council and the Marine Conservation Society. There are a variety of certification schemes out there.

We will move on to the next questions, which are from Stewart Stevenson.

I first want to make an observation about Label Rouge. If the French endorse something, it has to be good. That might not be based on reality, but it is based on perception. No comment is necessary.

I want to develop the point that Heather Jones raised about Chile. If expansion is too fast and there is no appropriate regulatory scheme and oversight, it can mean difficulties. Does the environmental interaction between fish farming and the pristine waters need to be managed more tightly as we expand the industry?

Who wants to start off with that one? You are all looking at each other, which means that I get to nominate. James, you can start and we will work along the panel.

The question is really about whether the interaction between the regulatory bodies and the industry needs to be tightened up. Is that a fair summary?

I think that is fair but, to be clear, I am talking particularly in the context of the proposed expansion of the industry.

Yes—that interaction will be critical. In production terms, the industry is relatively static. When I started in my role at Scotland Food & Drink six years ago, Scotland had 11 or 12 per cent of the world’s market share in Atlantic farmed salmon and we are now down to about 7 per cent. As demand rises, I am concerned that we will not be able to capitalise on that opportunity in Scotland.

Growth needs to be managed carefully. As Mr Finnie mentioned in his initial question, our environmental integrity and pristine waters are a key asset, so it is critical that we grow the industry, in value as much as in volume, collectively with the environmental agencies.

If you had asked me that question even 18 months ago, I would have said that I was not sure that we have good enough relationships between the industry and the regulatory bodies from the day-to-day operational point of view and in terms of proactive management. However, there has been a sea change there. An industry leadership group has now been established. Senior representatives from the Scottish Environment Protection Agency, Marine Scotland and Scottish Natural Heritage are around the table and managing that growth agenda. The relationships are now stronger and the collaboration and partnership that have marked the Scotch whisky industry’s environmental performance could now be mirrored in the aquaculture industry. I am much more hopeful that that kind of partnership and collaboration can underpin our growth journey over the next years.

You talked about the forum in which quite a lot of people are involved in regulation. Are there too many bodies for the regulation to be effective? There is some evidence that leads us to believe that.

I am happy to let James Withers answer that, Stewart, but you will have to make your peace with Mr Rumbles, because you have asked his questions.

I beg your pardon, Mr Rumbles.

I would be happy to let Heather Jones answer that because, to be honest, she probably has a better handle on it. As with many areas of Scottish industry and regulation, there are a number of different bodies with clear and distinct remits, but Heather Jones might be better placed to comment.

We will go to Elaine Jamieson first.

Aquaculture is like any other sector in Scotland. Growth has to be sustainable and well managed and aquaculture is no different. In fact, it might be ahead of other sectors, in that the industry and its partners in the public sector and wider stakeholders are cognisant of the challenges that they face, which is important.

10:30  

As James Withers has described, the aquaculture industry leadership group is a powerful group of people who are joined up, open and collaborative in their thinking—and collaboration is key. At a more tactical and operational level, when we look at supporting the industry to grow, we have a team Scotland approach in which we very much work as a critical friend who challenges and supports businesses and the sector to grow on multiple aspects using that opulent synergy of knowledge that we bring to the table, be it through economic development agencies, the innovation and the academic community or the regulators.

There are good examples of the integrated approach between regulators. I defer to Heather Jones to give you more detail on that. For example, in the islands, where I live, regulators and local authorities work well together.

My answer to the question whether we have too many regulatory bodies and whether the landscape is confused is no. Each body has a specific role and, as long as it seeks to have opinions and evidence on its area of expertise, it is clear what that role is. For example, the Crown Estate is a landlord, so companies pay it rent to anchor their nets to the sea bed. That is, in effect, its role. SNH’s role is to protect and to preserve species and habitats that are under threat or on European protected lists, so that concerns the impact on other environments. Marine Scotland’s role is specifically about the health, welfare and husbandry of fish. In the same way that the chief vet has responsibility for how rural land animals are cared for, what medical treatments they can be given and how to ensure that they flourish, Marine Scotland science has responsibility for fish. Finally, SEPA is responsible for the impact on the environment on the sea bed and the water column of waste deposits or other effluents in the system, which is the same as with agricultural systems for rearing cows and sheep, in which effluent and treatments go into the environment.

Your evidence today is welcome. It is in contradiction to a lot of the other evidence that we have received, so it is interesting to hear it, because there has been severe criticism of all the regulatory bodies involved in the aquaculture process.

I will focus on the evidence that Highland Council gave us. Planning applications for fish farms are taken on individually, as they have to be. A developer puts in an application and Highland Council, for example, has to deal with that application. When we put the planning issue to Highland Council, it said that it would be good if there was a more strategic view of the whole process of fish farming in the Highland region. It was clear that it thought that that would be an effective way of dealing with the planning process, rather than having to do so in a piecemeal way because of how the law stands. What are the main problems, if any, with the planning process for fish farming?

Who wants to start off on that? If none of you volunteer, I will have to choose someone.

The SSPO is my go-to organisation for commenting on the planning process. A more strategic overview and framework for how we grow the sector nationally would be helpful. At a local planning level, individual planning applications are taken individually, which I understand. They are subject to significant test and environmental assessments, but some applications run into difficulty, despite having approval from SEPA, SNH and all the regulatory authorities.

The chief planner sits round the table of the industry leadership group that I mentioned. The industry has developed the strategic framework for how it wants to go forward. If we had a planning system that demonstrated how it can support that development nationally, with all the checks and balances that such a planning system would need, that would make it easier for the industry to think about how it invests and grows. I suspect that that is not an issue just for the aquaculture industry; that is probably a comment on the planning system per se. I am not sure that the planning system is fully functional.

My committee colleagues seem to want to make me work for my living by jumping around the questions that they indicated that they wanted to ask. Does Elaine Jamieson want to talk about planning? I will then bring in John Finnie on planning issues, after which we will maybe try to go back to the issue of the status quo, which is where we started.

I am from an economic and community development agency and am not an expert on planning, but I agree with the comments of Heather Jones in particular. There are good examples that we could look at in which the regulators work effectively together and planning is effective. In Shetland, for example, there is a very good integrated approach in which a broad range of issues to do with the environment, businesses and the community are balanced.

Sustainable growth needs to be at the heart of planning, and there needs to be a conversation between the public and private sectors to consider what true sustainable growth will look like in the future so that there is clear direction and clear vision over the medium to long term.

I will roll a few issues together. What role should the local development plan play? Who should lead? It is clear that we want communities involved. Should planning be looked at in splendid isolation or integrated as part of other reforms? If I noted correctly what Heather Jones said, she talked about the distinct role that everyone has. If we are talking about a high-level vision, how is everything wrapped together so that, for instance, local people are not disenfranchised and there is an open and transparent process?

I suppose that I was quite surprised that the planner from Highland Council suggested that a macro body could make decisions, because it seems to me that the essence of local democracy is that decisions are taken as close to communities as possible.

Let us take Shetland as an example. There was a disease outbreak of infectious salmon anaemia there in 2009. That is another disease that has devastated Chile. Since then, the number of actively farmed sites has been significantly reduced. Productivity may still be the same, but the companies have rationalised and changed the dynamics of where they put the fish and they have changed their density levels. In Scotland, there are probably 300 planning permission sites, but only 200 of them are used. The point that I am making is that the industry becomes self-regulating, as does the environment. There will be disease outbreaks if there are too many sites and they are farmed too intensively. People can therefore pick and choose.

I go back to the issue of expansion and how to expand efficiently. Losses can be reduced, production on the existing sites can be optimised, expansion of existing sites can be considered, and new sites can be developed.

The Norwegian Government has done all those things in the past 15 years. People talk about Scotland being in a perilous position now, but our volume of tonnage—160,000 tonnes—is about the same as it was 15 years ago. Norway’s tonnage has gone from about that to 1.2 million tonnes. It has a bigger coastline but, to go back to the planning question, the local authorities and local communities there get a dividend from the companies’ investment. There is also a strategic national plan, which the Government approves in the Parliament. The espoused goal of that plan is that it would like the industry to grow to five times its size by 2050. There is a deliberate policy of encouraging expansion in areas of low population. More licences will be issued in regions in the north of Norway, because the aim is to keep communities active there. That point is relevant to Shetland, the Western Isles and Orkney. Without aquaculture jobs, some communities would not be able to keep existing.

Good morning, panel. You spoke about Norway’s coastline. We have a lot of coastline that we do not currently use for fish farms, specifically in the north and the east. If we were able to expand all the way round our coastline, would that have a positive impact? At the moment, everything is concentrated in the west.

There is a clear and wise reason why there is no fish farming on the east coast. It is a bit like the situation in Iceland, where there are farming areas and no-farming areas—Scotland has farming areas and no-farming areas. Ninety per cent of our wild salmon stocks and productive salmon rivers—including the Tay, the Tweed, the Dee and the Don—filter into the North Sea. They are all very productive, because they have much larger river catchment areas. If we were to change the balance, there would be a risk. At the moment, there is in effect protection for all the east coast fisheries because there are no fish farms there.

Another reason why fish farms are located on the west coast in Scotland and Norway is that the companies look for sheltered locations. In general, the North Sea is less sheltered than sea lochs on the west coast. That is partly about caring for the fish, but it is also about not putting humans who work for the company out into very exposed hostile environments in the North Sea. Companies have a welfare responsibility to their employees as well as to the food production system.

Just to push on the planning issue, there has been talk of macro policy and local democracy. Sometimes, it is good to have tension, as that focuses minds. The report “Scottish aquaculture: A view towards 2030” states that regulations and planning should move to a more—sorry; that is not right. It states:

“Regulations and planning move to be more proactive in supporting”—

I do not think that this is good English, one way or another, but never mind—it is maybe not me after all.

Why not make it into good English and get the point across?

Okay. The suggestion is that regulations and planning should

“move to be more proactive in supporting good growth, rather than”—

this is the telling phrase—

“passively enforcing standards.”

If we have standards, surely it is vital that they are enforced. Are we getting the balance right in decision making at local level, where there seems to be a lot of pressure on local authorities to play their part in contributing to the target? Is there undue pressure?

I suppose that I had not interpreted the word “passively” to mean that the regulations are not being enforced. All regulations in Scotland are enforced. The point of that phrase in the document is that, if we want to grow the industry, that will happen only if we actively do something to encourage it to happen. If we do not, we will just have the status quo.

As I said, demand is increasing in the global markets. People in Dubai, China and the US want to buy salmon, full stop, including Scottish salmon. Production has doubled or tripled in Norway and Chile, and it is increasing vastly in Canada and growing by 10 per cent a year in the Faroes. However, it is flat in Scotland. Therefore, Scotland is not taking any of that global market opportunity. It is a judgment for the people of Scotland whether we want it to do so, but the industry certainly feels that there is an opportunity to reinvest in the communities of Scotland and to use the coastline of Scotland. Very few countries in the world have the right climatic conditions to grow salmon, and Scotland happens to be one of them.

Could repeating that list be viewed as heaping pressure on local planners, who already feel under pressure? Like other members who represent rural areas, of course I want employment in rural areas, but I want the environment to be protected and the highest standards of welfare for creatures as well. There is a lot to be done there. Is excessive pressure being applied to local authorities?

I am not in a position to know that.

Are you applying pressure?

No—not in the slightest. Our role is to support investment in research.

We will move on to a question from Gail Ross, then I will try to get us back on track from where we left.

10:45  

I do not know whether anyone will be able to answer this question, but I will ask it anyway. It relates to something that we have not really touched on in any of our evidence sessions. Heather Jones mentioned global markets and the US market specifically. How will we continue to expand into American markets if we keep shooting seals? That is something that such markets are not very keen on.

In 2022, the US market is planning to bring in new regulations, to which every salmon-producing company will need to adhere, including those in Chile, where there are sea lions—which are much bigger and more aggressive in attacking fish in cages than seals in Scotland are—and those in Norway where, as you know, shooting is a national sport. There are issues about how to protect stocks of fish; farmers have the same issue in the risk of attacks on their sheep by, in my case, a family Labrador. We recognise that farmers have a right to protect their stock, which they have invested in and cared for, when there is the risk of predators.

A lot of work is done in Scotland that uses acoustic deterrent devices. The sea mammal research unit at the University of St Andrews has a great deal of expertise and does a great deal of research to ensure that those ADDs use frequencies and patterns of noise that are effective and not harmful. Many innovative research projects have been done. Ace Aquatec, a Scottish company that makes an acoustic deterrent device, just won a Queen’s award for enterprise. If such devices can be made successfully in Scotland, they can be sold to any fish-farming operation in the world, including those in Chile, where there are sea lions.

Unfortunately, Stewart Stevenson has left. His question related to the Environment, Climate Change and Land Reform Committee’s report, which I am sure that you will all have read. Kate Forbes, who was on that committee, and Donald Cameron, who is still on the committee, participated in the production of that report.

I am struggling a little to understand exactly what your views are on the report. Do you recognise the criticisms that are in it or do you not recognise the report’s view on where the industry is at the moment?

My take is that the industry is quite young compared with land farming and agriculture, which we have been doing for hundreds and thousands of years. In such industries, real challenges remain around animal health. For example, in the sheep industry, each year in Scotland a percentage of lambs are born that will never make the food chain due to disease, the weather and various environmental factors. Between 20 and 30 per cent of cattle that present to slaughter have liver fluke, which is a disease of the liver. Raising animals is tough because we have to deal with biological and environmental factors.

I do not think that any sector of the food and drink industry has a future if it does not embrace an almost zero tolerance of mortality and any disease issue. There should be a continual appetite to improve. If an individual company was before the committee, you should ask it whether it was content with where we are on mortality. I suspect—and I certainly hope—that it would say no. The industry is not perfect; I do not think that the industry itself would say that it is. Having worked with the industry, I think that it is up for embracing world-class standards of production and it absolutely accepts that there are improvements to be made. No one has more interest in achieving such improvements than companies and the industry itself.

Ultimately, losses cost money and they affect reputation. We have talked about the importance of brand. Scottish salmon sells on its brand—its food quality and environmental credentials. The industry has challenges, but my sense is that it recognises them and that there is a desire for improvement. The investment that the industry is putting into innovation and the fact that we have an aquaculture innovation centre, which Heather Jones is representing today, are signals that there is a desire to do better.

Do you recognise the report and its contents?

Yes, I do, but—

Thank you. Now—

Before you cut me off—

I was looking for a straight yes or no answer.

Yes—I absolutely recognise the contents of the report. However, to put that in context, in Scotland we have a spirit and desire to embrace world-class standards of production. My overarching point is that the one thing we know for certain is that the demand for global protein and for Scottish salmon is increasing; today, every day this week and every day for the rest of the year, we will eat a million meals in the UK involving salmon. I would far rather that we met that demand from systems in Scotland, which we can control and through which we can add economic value here, rather than having that demand met from elsewhere. If, for example, we had a moratorium or stopped producing salmon, that demand would not go away; it would be met from systems over which we have no control.

I do not think that that is what the report suggested. Can Elaine Jamieson answer briefly, because I know that members of the ECCLR Committee want to come in on the back of that?

I very much agree with James Withers’s comments. The growth and development of any sector cannot be viewed in isolation, but should be viewed holistically and in an evidence-based manner in terms of growth for the economy and areas within it. Having spoken extensively to the industry—in fact, I spoke to it yesterday, at seafood expo global—I know that it is fair to say that the industry is very cognisant of the challenges that were highlighted in the report and that work is well under way to address some of those challenges.

I recognise a number of the issues that the report covers, but I have a slight issue with the underlying premise, which appears to be that Scottish salmon farming is, in and of itself, bad and having a negative effect on the environment. That does not seem to me to be the right mindset with which to approach the matter.

Members of the industry would say that they fully own and recognise the fact that they are responsible for achieving optimal fish growth and welfare while minimising impacts. That is partly why, in the three and a half years that SAIC has been in existence, the industry has invested in 23 different research projects with us, which have largely been focused on dealing with some of the issues that the environment committee’s report talks about. Of our £34 million-worth of projects, £22 million is industry hard cash. The industry is putting significant millions of pounds’ worth of investment into Scottish universities to help to solve the problems that it is experiencing in Scottish waters. That seems to me to be a sign of a mature and responsible industry that wants to tackle the problems that it is facing.

Good morning. As the convener said, I am the reporter from the ECCLR Committee. With the greatest respect, I have to disagree with the characterisation of the report in what Heather Jones has just said. In fairness, what the report says is that aquaculture has to operate to the highest environmental standards and it is not doing that. Underlying the report, and the committee’s concerns, is the projected expansion by doubling production from the present 160,000 tonnes over 15 years.

The concerns of the ECCLR Committee are, effectively, that, if that expansion happens and the industry is not operating to the highest environmental standards, we have a problem. I am sure that Kate Forbes can add to that, but it is important to put the ECCLR Committee’s views on the record, and the report and summary letter enshrine those views. Do you not agree that it is in the product’s interest to produce it to the highest environmental standards? People want to eat salmon that they know is produced to those standards.

Yes. That is a very straightforward answer. In some ways it comes back to the point we made earlier about how consumer retail perceptions and scrutiny will drive more improvements than anything else. We see that in the realms of food waste, and plastic is obviously a huge issue at the moment. A large part of the seal issue is about consumer assurance and welfare.

I want the aquaculture industry in Scotland to grow. It could have huge benefits, and the social and economic sustainability factors are as important as the environmental sustainability factor. However, that should happen only on the basis of supporting companies that embrace the highest standards of regulation.

As a consumer and someone who lives in Scotland and values its landscape and natural heritage, I want to see that growth only if it meets not only bare-minimum standards but world-leading standards. What is going on in Brussels now and in Singapore later this week will help to sell the product.

James, you started off well, with a very short answer, but it got extremely long.

I want to focus on mortalities, which James Withers has already referred to. You said that the industry is not satisfied with the current level of mortality. Is the current level of mortality acceptable, in light of the level of mortality you would accept in any other food source?

Secondly, everyone is happy to say that something is not acceptable, but what should be done, and by whom, to address the issue? That mortality rate has a negative impact not only on the environment, but on investors and consumers.

I am confident that the industry is not satisfied with the current mortality rate and is actively addressing the issue. That is evident through the innovation activity that producers and businesses in the upstream supply chain are engaged in, and through the investments and the progress that they are making around mortality. Significant investments are being made by small and medium-sized enterprises as well as our large businesses.

Yesterday, I had a conversation with one of our salmon-producing companies and learned about the proactive approach that it has taken with at least two other farming companies in a specific geographical location to address mortalities. I understand that mortality events often create a sense of urgency and a need for action. However, those businesses are stepping back from large productivity numbers to address short-term challenges and longer-term growth opportunities. They are working together around some very localised fish management operations—for example, they are synchronising treatments.

The fish health welfare work that is going on, which Heather will be able to speak about much more eloquently than I can, is a good example of industry leading the way, supported by the public sector and wider stakeholders, and taking ownership of the work to improve the current situation.

The causes of mortality in fish farming can involve bacteria, viruses and parasites in the environment, insufficient or poor nutrition and feeding, human error, and physical trauma through, for example, big storms slamming fish into the nets and bruising them. There are lots of causes of mortality, and every farming company that I know is seeking to minimise its mortalities because they represent a significant amount of lost profits.

What can we do about mortalities? We can improve water quality, because fish thrive in a highly oxygenated environment. We can vaccinate against some of the diseases that fish have, such as bacterial kidney disease and pancreatic disease. Pharmaceutical companies have worked with the industry to identify causes of mortality and how they can be avoided.

We know that vaccination is a successful strategy in human populations. We can have the best possible management and husbandry to minimise the risk of disease outbreak, through stocking densities and how often you handle the fish. We want to handle the fish as little as possible because fish suffer stress in the same way as humans and, if you crowd them too much, their performance and eating quality go down. The retailers will specify all manner of ways in which the fish farming companies have to ensure that their fish are healthy and ready for market. The farmers want every fish that they put to sea to come back out again.

The question was about whether there are too many mortalities and the answer is yes, but people are doing everything that they can to bring those numbers down.

11:00  

Can you quantify those mortalities as a percentage of fish that go to sea?

I do not have that data, but I am sure that the SSPO does.

I have read in the press that it is somewhere between 20 and 25 per cent.

Do you think that we are moving fast enough on the issue? Fish mortality rates hit a record high in 2016. There would be an absolute outcry if the mortality rates in any other form of agriculture hit those same highs—we just would not stand for it. Why is fish farming different? Are we innovating fast enough to reduce mortality rates?

In the past five years, there has been a significant trend of increased mortalities because of disease. That is correlated partly to rising sea water temperatures and partly to viruses and diseases becoming evident in Scottish waters that were not previously evident here—there are diseases that started in Tasmania, went to Ireland and somehow came to Scotland. Once you have those diseases in your environment, you cannot get rid of them. It is perfectly fair to ask what we can do about that.

One of the biggest causes of mortality in the past couple of years has been complex gill disease, which affects how the fish breathe. Two weeks ago, there was an international conference in Galway on how to find answers to those complex gill issues and it was attended by industry professionals, Scottish researchers and members of the Scottish innovation centre. One of the things that Scotland would like to do is to become the expert and host of that international forum, so that we do as much research as we possibly can to resolve the problems that we know are happening both here and around the world. That can come through academic, industry and international research collaborations. We need to draw on the expertise and consider what the Tasmanians have learned about gill disease, how we can apply that to Scotland and how we can make the best possible interventions to minimise the mortality rate.

I have one further question on gill disease. I attended the ECCLR Committee and asked whether the industry can do anything once the disease starts to develop and the answer was to harvest the fish before they die from the disease. Does that hide the true extent of the problem? Is the problem bigger than the 20 or 25 per cent mortality rate?

To put that into context, I am a farmer—I declare that as an interest—and when a farmer is calving, for example, they will accept a small mortality in the region of 4 per cent, which is sad, but probably a reasonable level of mortality about which there is not a lot that one can do. However, we are talking about a mortality rate in excess of four or five times that in the salmon industry.

Can you explain a bit more about gill disease mortality? Is the problem bigger than the industry has indicated, because the fish farmers are harvesting fish earlier?

I do not know the answer to that question. I will make an observation that I learned from a conversation with the Scottish Government’s chief vet on the comparison between the mortality rates of land-based animals and fish. Fish spawn by generating 100,000 eggs per fish and not all of those will become wild salmon from wild salmon rivers—the same is true for other fish—whereas cows have one calf or possibly two, and so the mortality rates of fish are not analogous to the mortality rates of land animals. That is according to Scotland’s chief vet.

I am sure that we accept that there are subtle differences between fish and animals.

My question follows on quite well, because we have just talked about mortality and Ms Jones has given us a wide range of reasons for it. However, one of the committee’s fascinations is sea lice. I am amazed that we have got as far through the meeting as we have without too much mention of them.

First, I ask for a general comment on what panellists’ views are on sea lice. We have heard that some farms are doing extremely well and that other countries have stricter controls. The ASC suggested that its normal limit is 0.1 female louse per fish, which seems quite low—and lower than we are achieving. Are you content with the policy as it is at the moment or should we be tightening up or copying Norway a bit more?

I am keen to give Heather Jones a break, because she has been under the microscope. Does anyone else on the panel wish to come in on that or do I have to go to Heather, by default, to answer?

I can give Heather a few minutes’ respite, but not too much because she is the expert on that area.

It is fair to say that producing companies are deploying a wide range of strategies to tackle sea lice with the support of innovative businesses in the supply chain. Although treatments remain an option, there is an increasing number of others, such as baths, thermolysis and hydrolysis. We also have some very ambitious supply chain companies coming through that work hand in glove with producers in looking at such solutions.

Although we are an economic and community development agency, when we meet industry representatives we are always keen to understand their challenges as much as their opportunities and how we can work with them in the future. One company in Scotland that has had localised but very challenging problems with sea lice has deployed not one or two but multiple approaches to tackling them. It has been working in collaboration with its neighbours in the geographies in which they operate. Yesterday, it was telling me that, from March 2017 to March 2018, it had seen an 87 per cent reduction in adult female lice per salmon.

Could you give us what that figure was, and what it is now?

Not from my brief notes. I received a presentation from the company yesterday but, unfortunately, I do not have it with me. I suggest that when the committee hears evidence from producers next week, they will be able to give much more detailed information on what they are actually doing in their businesses.

I am getting a little bit of an impression—not just from yourself, Ms Jamieson, but from everyone—that there is a laissez-faire approach that says that the producers are taking it all very seriously, but Norway’s approach is much more proactive. It has green, yellow and red zones. If I understand those correctly, if a producer has too many lice per fish and goes over the Norwegian limit, they will then be in a red zone, and it will automatically have to reduce the amount of stock that it has and no more farms will be allowed in that area. Such an approach suggests that, rather than just leaving it to the individual producer to see the benefit that it will get from having fewer lice, the Government—or someone—could come in and impose more. Are you in favour of that?

I do not think that I am in a position to comment on that. That rests with the industry.

Okay—that is fair enough. I will ask Ms Jones.

Heather, it looks as though you have had a chance to gather your thoughts.

I will do my very best. The Norwegian system is being introduced rather than it being the case that it has been implemented. The industry here has its own code of good practice on when treatment should happen. There are treatment thresholds that are below that, and there are also times at which we will want to treat at an individual net or pen level rather than just monitor at the whole-farm level. The industry has improved its control of lice by changing some of its sampling protocols, intervening earlier and minimising the risk of the exponential growth of this devastatingly devious parasite that we have not yet found a way to bang on the head.

It is worth saying that salmon go to sea completely devoid of lice: they are utterly clean. They come out of freshwater hatcheries pristine. Just as Labradors get ticks from—in my dog’s case—wild deer when they go walking in the countryside, wild fish carry lice that then get into the farmed environment.

Smolts are clear of lice when they go to the sea from rivers. As you know, their passage through fish farm areas to the sea is relatively short, as is their passage on the way back. Lice are a naturally occurring parasite, and it would not be right to blame the problem on either side.

I am simply saying that the parasite is endemic and pervasive, and it is highly prevalent in the water column. It is in the environment. If fish are placed in a sea-water environment, there will always be a risk that they will get lice.

Okay—I am sorry. Continue.

I have slightly lost my train of thought.

Obviously, companies want to treat fish in a way that minimises lice, their impact on fish mortality rates, and their potential impact on other species. Studies have been done on the impact of sea lice from farmed fish on wild salmon. The most persuasive study that I have seen comes from Irish academics. It says that sea lice constitute possibly 1 per cent of all the causes of mortality among wild salmon. Yes, lice have an effect, but they are one of many effects that cause a decline in wild salmon stocks. Many things could be done to improve the return rates of wild salmon stocks, but there are also many things that we cannot do anything about. We cannot change the fact that sea water temperatures are rising off the Faroes, that what salmon predate is less available to them, or that a lot of wild seals eat a lot of wild salmon. What we can do, and what the industry does, is try to minimise the impacts.

In a sense, there are two issues: the good of the fish and the return for the farm. However, I am concerned about the limits that have been set. I referred earlier to the Aquaculture Stewardship Council and similar bodies. The ASC’s limit is a bit arbitrary at 0.1 female louse per fish. If that limit becomes widely accepted in supermarkets in Germany, America and other countries, and our fish do not have ASC or any other accreditation—I think that the committee will be doing some more work on that—is there a danger that we will miss out? Do we as a society need to do more to protect the Scottish industry? For example, SEPA has been criticised for not carrying out enough unannounced visits. Am I right in thinking that that is an additional worry?

The only way to answer the question, “At which point should we intervene?” is to have some really good science that tells us that the best time to intervene is at 0.5 or 0.2 ovigerous female louse per fish, or whatever the figure may be. The ASC has a limit of 0.1 and Norway has some other number, but the levels of lice depend on the way in which someone is farming, the location, the sea water temperatures, the currents and all sorts of other factors. Plenty of locations in Scotland do not suffer with any sea lice problems whatsoever, but individual sites are very prone to such pressures, so it is important to consider where farms are sited. We could think about expanding growth in Orkney, for example, where there are incredible tidal flow exchanges between the North Sea and the Atlantic and no problems with lice.

I want to ask Mr Withers about this. How do you see the supermarkets, especially international ones, going forward? Will they look for accreditation by the ASC or some other body? Will they take into account the number of lice? There are reasons that the levels of lice differ in different areas, but I suspect that a supermarket in Germany would not fully understand that and would take a very fixed line.

Accreditation, whether it is British Retail Consortium accreditation at processing level, the SSPO code of good practice or MSC accreditation, is a gateway into the retail industry. It is a given. The challenge for the industry is that there is a lot of accreditation; the retailers also have their own accreditation.

On the question about lice, I honestly do not know whether that will become a factor.

11:15  

Do most retailers have their own accreditation, or do they rely on others for it?

It tends to be a combination of both. The British Retail Consortium is part of the global food safety initiative, which is the entry point. I do not know as much about the fish side, but vegetable producers who supply the major retailers must be BRC accredited and they will almost certainly be inspected on any differences by every single retailer, so there might be four or five unannounced inspections. A number of the retailers also inspect salmon farms.

I have a brief point for James Withers. I welcome your comments. If I were sitting where you are, I would not want to talk about lice because, given your role, it is clearly a negative issue. Public perception is hugely important. Even the term “lice” is not one that we want to talk about. Do you not have deep concerns about even the fact that we are having to discuss this?

No. Mortality is an issue in every form of animal production. Industry will benefit in the long term if it is open about the fact that it has production challenges and that it wants to address them. The alternative would be to say that it is not an issue and to try to bury the matter and hope that no one talks about it. That would not be a helpful strategy in the longer term; such an approach would almost certainly come back and bite us. The debate, which is about how we tackle the issue and not whether there is a problem, is a healthy one.

Thank you—that is reassuring.

The “Aquaculture Growth to 2030” report recommends that there should be

“an examination of the role of Marine Scotland as both regulator and policy advocate for development.”

It goes on:

“There is an opportunity to align with other food and drink sectors in Scotland by moving the development role into the Scottish Government’s Food, Drink & Rural Communities Division”.

Do you have a view on that recommendation or any thoughts on its pros and cons?

That has already happened, I think. People who work in the food and drink division, which is in the agriculture directorate, are responsible for the food promotion side of salmon. The Marine Scotland side is about regulation.

So you are saying that Marine Scotland does not undertake any policy development work, and that that has all been moved into the Scottish Government.

The policy work that is being done in the food and drink division is about the case for salmon, as part of the expansion of Scotland’s food production system. A lot of policy thinking is going on between the Government and the industry about a farmed fish health framework, which Mr Ewing is keen to see developed and delivered. That is about improving the industry’s performance in how it creates value for Scotland.

Another of the recommendations in that same report is to introduce innovation sites. Has there been any progress on that?

The bad news for Heather Jones is that that is probably one for her, as she works for the body that is technically responsible for the delivery of that recommendation. The recommendation was up there, in bright lights, as part of the top-tier recommendations.

The industry has had a number of discussions with Government about the scope for innovation on sites and equipment. We are funding new equipment and technologies that might improve production performance. That piece of work is on-going, and the Government is considering what would be permissible within the regulatory framework in which we operate.

I will focus on SEPA’s role, although I realise that we do not have a SEPA representative here. SEPA is in the process of changing its approach to regulation, because it recognises that the status quo is not an option. SEPA is looking at issues including protecting the environment and biodiversity by ensuring that fish production is matched to the environmental capacity. It is also looking at increasing the capture and beneficial use of the waste, reducing medicine release into the environment and supporting action to protect wild fish. Will the changes that SEPA is proposing in its sector plan improve regulation of the sector, and are further changes needed on top of the ones that I have mentioned? If so, what are those changes?

I feel sorry for Heather Jones, because everyone looks away or looks at her. I am trying to give her a chance to gather her thoughts. One of the points in that question concerned increasing the capture and beneficial use of waste. We have not touched on that, so Heather Jones might like to pick up on that, as she has now had a chance to gather her thoughts.

I am not particularly well placed to comment on what SEPA’s role should or should not be and how well it is playing that; I do not have the insight to offer a view on that. I am sure that the work that SEPA is doing with the industry is about better regulation and outcomes. Whatever changes SEPA is trying to make, it is very much committed to the one-planet vision, which we have heard Terry A’Hearn talk about. Anne Anderson, from whom you heard last week, is the chief officer for going beyond compliance. That set of discussions and thinking is going on between the regulator and the industry.

Does anyone else want to come in on that? Heather, you did not touch on the capture and beneficial use of waste. Do you want to talk about that innovation?

I confess that I do not know anything about it.

Okay.

I recognise that we do not have a SEPA representative here, which makes the questions difficult. Do you have any thoughts on what data the SEPA licences should be based on? Can you comment on that?

No.

We are struggling here, convener.

James Withers, I am always delighted to bring you in.

How kind. A good description of the relationship between SEPA and the industry in recent years would probably be that it has been sub-optimal. I have seen examples in other sectors of that being the case, such as agriculture and whisky. If we went back 10 or 15 years and asked SEPA whether there was any sector that it was concerned about, whisky might have been up there. However, SEPA developed a strong relationship with the industry body, the Scotch Whisky Association. The association was at the forefront in writing a proactive plan, and a partnership developed so that the model moved away from SEPA simply acting as policeman to it acting as a partner in improvement.

My sense, both from Terry A’Hearn’s leadership and from people who are directly involved, is that there is now much greater scope for developing that kind of partnership relationship. Previously, industry was in one place and SEPA was in another, telling the industry to crack on while it acted as the policeman, looked at what was happening and enforced if necessary. That old-world model needs to be consigned to the dustbin. A much more proactive approach can now be taken and there are good examples, whether of bathing waters in relation to the agriculture sector or the use of water resources in the whisky industry, which could be used as a model for aquaculture. I think that that is starting to happen.

Thank you.

We will move on to the next set of questions.

Good morning, panel. I have kept quiet throughout the session, listening with great intent to the fascinating discussion. I will touch briefly on the point that I was asked to look at, which concerns research, development and innovation in the industry, and conclude by asking for some commentary that is more of an overview of the future of the industry.

Much of the research is very technically led, addressing specific production issues of which we are aware and the environmental aspects of production. Very little is said about innovation in the economic or management aspects of the industry. Does anyone have any comments or views on how research or innovation that is not focused only on the technical aspects could better facilitate effective growth in the industry?

There is a huge area of innovation beyond simply addressing some of the biological challenges. Those innovations, which are relevant across a number of sectors in the food and drink industry, run from sustainable packaging through to improvements in logistics.

I am hopeful on that front, because two initiatives that have developed over the past wee while offer some hope about Scotland being the home of real innovation right through the supply chain in aquaculture as well as in the primary production. One is the make innovation happen project, which is bringing together under one roof—or on one website with one phone number—about 150 existing support tools for food businesses that want to innovate.

The second is a bit more tangential: the coming together of Scotland’s research institutes under the Scottish environment, food and agriculture research institutes—SEFARI—collaboration. The likes of the Rowett institute, which leads on nutrition, the Moredun Research Institute, which has traditionally been about livestock production and animal health on land, the James Hutton Institute and Scotland’s Rural College are coming together. That offers real hope to better translate some of the research on the ground in farms or processing. Some of the work that has gone on into endemic production diseases in livestock, feed conversion and biological efficiency in land animals is transferable into the water.

A lot of the innovation will be market led. On nutrition and health, it will be about people wanting to improve their dietary balance and food intake, as well as wanting to think about sustainable packaging, for example. A lot of innovation is happening in that. You make an important point that we should not focus only on the production challenges; we should consider the wider market and efficiency opportunities.

I will give Heather Jones a wee break by talking about innovation.

At Highlands and Islands Enterprise, we are very ambitious, alongside our businesses, about growth through innovation across the supply chain. We are looking upstream and downstream. Innovation is not only about capturing challenges; it is about creating high-value opportunities in the economy—particularly, for my role, the rural economy—and capturing as much value in Scotland as possible.

Innovation takes many forms. The Scottish Aquaculture Innovation Centre is focused on business-to-academic partnerships, but we also consider business-to-business collaborations not only to solve challenges in the here and now but to look further ahead into the future. We also support businesses individually.

One live example that is taking up quite a bit of my colleagues’ time is a project called aquaSENS, which is still at the conceptual stage. It takes the aquaculture industry as a whole. We are considering fin-fish and shellfish production in Shetland and working across three innovation centres—SAIC, the Industrial Biotechnology Innovation Centre and the Data Lab—to consider how we can use things that capture real-time data to inform real-time activity. That will enable people to view what is happening remotely and make well-informed decisions about what they do on their fin-fish or shellfish farm so that they can become much more predictive in their approach to the business over the medium to longer term. It will also provide a robust set of data over the longer term—a very hard evidence base that holistically captures as much information as possible about what happens in a region.

We are working with a range of stakeholders and being led by the industry. We are working with the Scottish centre of excellence in satellite applications—SOXSA—at the University of Strathclyde and the Satellite Applications Catapult to develop the project and we are submitting a bid to the industrial strategy challenge fund for a sizeable amount of money to help to bring that forward. That concerns some of our wider ambition on innovation.

Skills and training are key to innovation. We need people in our country with the right level of skills and knowledge, whether that is acquired through the academic or vocational pathway. A lot of work is going on across industry, the public sector partnership and stakeholders to empower people in Scotland to ensure that the aquaculture sector is a positive, progressive career destination and is accessible to all.

Work is under way and more is to be done not only on reaching school leavers, young people and the people who influence young people, but on making the industry accessible to more mature entrants. A good example of that is the Scottish vocational qualification level 4 in fish farm management, which allows people to learn, develop and make a positive contribution to the fish farm sector at a later stage in their life.

11:30  

I will give Heather Jones a bigger break and bring in Gail Ross, who has another question.

The HIE report “The Value of Aquaculture to Scotland” said that attracting staff is difficult. I was up in the west coast in my constituency a couple of weeks ago and I spoke to several people who said that there are jobs available and people want them, but access to housing in many small communities is preventing people from taking them up. Do you have a comment on that?

I would not disagree at all. That is what we hear from our businesses. The situation is more challenging in some parts of the Highlands and Islands than in others. Infrastructure is key to having a successful sector. Norway, for example, is further ahead than we are on roads and information technology infrastructure. Setting aside housing as an infrastructure challenge, attracting people to rural and remote areas or attracting young people to come back to those areas is a challenge because they expect to be able to use a mobile phone and get on the internet.

A positive thing to come out of the aquaculture industry specifically is that it is accelerating the speed of some infrastructure developments in the region. To go back to the aquaSENS project, there may be an opportunity to improve mobile connectivity in some remote rural areas. On the Isle of Mull, Scottish Sea Farms needed very good broadband connectivity, so it went ahead and did that and there is now a community asset that people can use.

To answer your question, it is true that housing is a problem, but we also need to consider infrastructure.

Now that Heather Jones has had a good break to marshal her thoughts, we can go back to Jamie Greene’s question.

There is a lot of technological development around the crunching of big data, for example in the use of sensors and imaging systems, such as subsea cameras. We have sponsored a project that is working on a DNA grab of the sediment below sea cages—a sample of that can allow a much quicker response on what the impacts are. A lot of new technology is being applied in the industry.

As Elaine Jamieson said, the industry would like to have strong broadband, because having an internet of things allows better farm management. It is the same situation in land-based agriculture: agritech is transforming the information that farmers have so that they can optimise their feeding and treatment regimes. That is all coming through and some innovative young Scottish companies are contributing to it.

Thank you for those very comprehensive and diverse answers. It sounds as though some great work is being done, using technology in particular, to advance research. Given that we are approaching the end of the meeting, perhaps I can take a step back and summarise a theme that has come through much of the evidence—that of how we square the circle of achieving the significant growth in the industry that many people desire yet still address the valid and substantive concerns about the environmental impact of that growth. That theme is reflected in the work of the ECCLR Committee. We know that demand is not going away and that if we do not meet that demand, someone else will, as Mr Withers said.

However, throughout our evidence sessions, I have never been clear about who should be responsible. Should responsibility lie with the industry or the Government? Norway, for example, took a more top-down approach, through legislation and policy to control planning, regulation, innovation and growth. In Scotland, there seems to be a wide discourse on which agency or which bit of Government, industry or academia should be responsible. Does anyone have a view on who should spearhead that growth? How can it be achieved in a sustainable way?

I am not going to directly answer your question by saying who should spearhead it, but I will share my observation that all stakeholders in the industry have become increasingly collaborative. I am a great believer in industries being led by industries. Industry drives the economy, not the public sector. We are here to support industry. I would be keen for industry to come forward with some solutions and a call to action to the public sector with regard to how we should support it.

As the industry, which is becoming increasingly sophisticated, continues to move forward, we all have a responsibility to chart that path and offer support. We should be ambitious with regard to growth, but not at the expense of environmental sustainability, rural communities or our position in the global marketplace. The opulent synergy will be brought about by our having people at the table who can be critical friends to one another in the sense of challenging and supporting that discussion as it goes forward. There is an issue about process and about being focused on outcomes, but I do not feel happy about commenting on who should lead that.

I think that the industry has set out a vision of expanding the Scottish economy through expanding production in a sustainable way. That is very much captured in one of the infographics in the report, which shows three overlapping circles in a Venn diagram, which came from a United Nations programme about how to get the optimum relationship between economic growth, social benefit and environmental protection. The industry’s ambition is to grow within those three parameters.

This discourse is helpful, because it throws up issues that people will want to tease out and understand, and it will allow them to inform Government policy in relation to where things should go next. The flipside is that, if you decide that you do not want growth, that has ramifications for economies such as the one that Elaine Jamieson is concerned with, and it also has implications in relation to the foreign investment that might come to Scotland or, alternatively, go to Canada or the Faroes. That comes back to James Withers’s point: global demand will be there, but will Scotland’s communities benefit from it, without trashing the environment? Nobody wants to trash the environment, least of all farmers. It is the nature of politics to try to find that answer.

Before James Withers answers, I would just make the comment that that organic growth has not happened. Production levels in Scotland are relatively flat compared with the substantial growth levels that we have seen in other markets. Although I take the point that the issue is down to industry, I do not see that leaving things to industry has had the desired effect.

We hear a lot about the precautionary approach, but I would say that the DEPOMOD model that SEPA has used for the past 20 years has been so precautionary that it has limited growth that could have happened without having damaging effects. That is not what the perception is; the perception is the opposite. However, if you take hard data from the past 20 years of SEPA’s work to examine the impact, you will see that its modelled forecast said that the impact would be high but it was actually low. The amount of growth that there could have been was not achieved because the model said that the growth had to be kept low. The model underestimated the capacity of the environment, rather than the other way around, in some cases if not in others. That is why you need feedback loops and data to tell you where you can sustainably grow and where you cannot. That comes back to the Norwegian red, amber, green idea.

My point is that there has not been growth in Scotland because there has been a great deal of caution and nervousness that, if you were to ground-truth the models, would not be proven to be necessary.

Partnership between industry and the public sector is the single most important answer to the question. I would argue that the food and drink sector has been an economic success story over the past 10 years and that, if you strip everything else away, you will see that the single biggest reason for that is that there has been a partnership between industry and the public sector.

That does not mean that it is always a comfortable and cosy relationship—the industry challenges Government and Government challenges the industry. The food and drink industry identified a growth opportunity and believed that there would be benefits from it, and aquaculture has now done the same—the growth document has been referred to a couple of times. What happened is that a partnership was created that debates how we should help the industry to grow rather than whether it should grow and whether that is important. It needs to grow carefully and sustainably, and the partnership helps that to happen.

From a wider food and drink point of view, we rejected the idea of creating a single body that would spearhead growth and do it all. We thought that we would lose three to five years of our lives debating structures, pension liabilities and all sorts. Instead, we wanted a partnership to be formed in which each individual party would have a specific role that would be built around an agreed objective and opportunity. That is the opportunity in aquaculture, which will involve creating a forum where people can talk about difficult stuff such as gill disease and lice in a way that is based on a desire to fix issues so that there is a stronger platform on which to grow.

I think that we have got through all the questions, but I am looking around the committee members to check.

I thought that you were soliciting a question.

Anyone listening in on the meeting would think that you were obsessed with growth, as you keep repeating the word. Surely, when there are challenges, what you want to do is consolidate and make good. Is enough not enough? What is the obsession with growth?

I am obsessed with growth. I confess to being a signed-up obsessive because, through growth, we add value and jobs—

When does that stop?

It stops if there is environmental damage or if undue pressure is being put on communities or social structures. There are both regulatory and natural limits. In this sector and elsewhere, I see growing demand and an opportunity for Scotland to tap into that demand. The natural protection that is built in is that we will only grow and tap into the demand if we have all the environmental safeguards that we have talked about.

One thing that we have not touched on that is of key interest to me is community sustainability and community development across the rural economy. We are talking about one of the distinct regional opportunities for the Scottish economy at the moment. That opportunity is driven by demand and by all the work that has been done by the industry and those of us who support it. We should not underestimate what the sector does for the social fabric of Scotland, particularly in our rural economies. I welcome the opportunity to take that into the debate. What might not necessarily be apparent is the valuable contribution that the very existence of such businesses in our rural economy, with the increased investment, the innovation and the higher-quality jobs that they provide, brings to the social fabric of Scotland. The issue is not about growth; it is about inclusive growth and the sustainability of our communities.

I will pick out and give you a peppering of a few random and probably disconnected examples. In the food and drink sector, salaries sit at around the minimum and living wage level. That is a challenge that James Withers and I, along with our colleagues in the food and drink partnership, are working hard to address.

Elaine, can I stop you there? We have had growth in everything except terms and conditions for the people who deliver it. How is that a challenge? That should be a given.

I was about to say that, in aquaculture, we see significant growth in the quality of employment opportunities and the career pathways that people have. We also see that in the communities in which they live. Growth is much more than just business growth; it has an effect on the rural economy and the people who live in those communities.

For the avoidance of doubt, Highlands and Islands Enterprise is committed to growing the wages and improving the terms and conditions of workers in the aquaculture sector. Is that what you are saying?

We are committed to that for all sectors, but aquaculture is a sector where we see success.

That is reassuring. We can work together on that.

That is a point of consensus on which we will end that line of questioning.

We have come to the end of our questions, so I thank James Withers, Elaine Jamieson and Heather Jones for coming to the meeting today and giving evidence. It has been an interesting session, and I thank them for their time.

Meeting closed at 11:44.