November 28th is the last day of the ASC (Accepted Standards Committee) certification of a rainbow trout farm project in Longyangxia Dam, Qinghai Province. The legal department of China Biodiversity Conservation and Green Development Foundation (CBCGDF) sent a letter to the responsible ASC certification body and relevant ASC principals and urgently put forward two suggestions, requesting the certification body to take the audit of the project seriously.
ASC certification is an international certification system based on the protection of communities and the environment and efforts to ensure the sustainable development of the aquaculture industry. According to the system, the audit of institutions applying for ASC certification will be published on the ASC website at least 30 days in advance, and November 28th is the last day after the on-site audit and preliminary audit of the application project of rainbow trout breeding farm of Longyangxia Dam in Qinghai.
The rainbow trout farm project of Qinghai Longyangxia Dam is located in Longyangxia Dam of Longyangxia Town, Gonghe County. The project management company is Qinghai Minze Longyangxia Ecological Water Breeding Co., Ltd. and the organization responsible for ASC audit and recognition is Shanghai Tianxiang Quality and Technical Service Co., Ltd.
Freshwater rainbow trout originated from the Pacific coast of North America. After it was introduced into China in the 1980s-1990s, there are large water cage culture and pond culture of rainbow trout in all provinces of the Yellow River Basin. In 2008, the School of Life Sciences of Northwest University investigated the introduction of fish in the Yellow River Basin and found out that there are 31 kinds of fish introduced into the Yellow River Basin, among which freshwater rainbow trout is one of the major alien fish. Its cultivation is mainly distributed in Longyangxia Dam in Qinghai Province, Liujiaxia Reservoir in Gansu Province and the middle reaches of Luohe River in the branch of the Yellow River. In recent years, researchers have found escaping rainbow trout in the Yellow River Basin, settled in the 1000 km section from Liujiaxia to Maqu and established a natural population, bringing ecological risks to the local indigenous fish. In addition, the environmental pollution caused by the aquaculture industry has also attracted attention.
In this regard, the legal department of CBCGDF thinks that the project is located in the upper reaches of the Yellow River, which is the drinking water source of Longyangxia Dam in Qinghai Province, with a special geographical location. It is very important for the ecological environment protection of the region and even the Yellow River Basin, and there are two major ecological risks. Therefore, CBCGDF reminds ASC audit certification bodies and relevant ASC principals to strive for scientific, rigorous and prudent approval when auditing the project. According to the legal department of CBCGDF, the possible environmental risks of rainbow trout farm in Longyangxia, Qinghai Province are as follows:
There is a potential threat risk to the indigenous fish population in Qinghai.
According to the information publicized on the ASC website, part 2.5 of the publicized information shows that "the mesh size of the three farms of aquaculture fails to effectively meet the requirements of anti escape monitoring” and “a small number of fish escapes continuously appear in the records”. Rainbow trout as an alien species, this project has the situation of rainbow trout escape, which may cause the risk of biological invasion to the local indigenous fish population.
2. Environmental risk of aquaculture pollution.
According to public information 3.3.6, Longyangxia Dam is a medium nutrient water body. In the breeding production of rainbow trout farms in Longyangxia, Qinghai, a large number of feed, disinfectants, antibiotics, various hormones, etc. need to be put in, which will easily lead to water pollution and eutrophication. Longyangxia belongs to the plateau reservoir water body. Once it is polluted, its ecological environment risk will be greatly affected. In addition, the public information 3.3.3 shows that the water quality detection limit of rainbow trout farm in Longyangxia, Qinghai Province is 0.01mg/L, which is far higher than 0.002mg/L required by ASC certification, and fails to meet the certification standard.
Recently, CBCGDF received the reply from ASC certification authority that: the audit team of ASC of the enterprise has adopted a very prudent way, and the audit team will judge the requirements of each clause based on the facts and objective data, and form the final certification decision and conclusion according to the confirmation of its and the feedback of all parties. With regard to the above two concerns, the audit team will follow up and confirm for the first time and will answer them in a unified way.
CBCGDF will continue to pay attention to the direction of this project.
Original Chinese article:
http://www.cbcgdf.org/NewsShow/4854/10576.html
By / Xue Tongtong