ABSTRACT
Since the ‘Idle No More’ protest movement sparked a new wave of indigenous activism across Canada starting in December 2012, ‘justice for the wild salmon’ has been a central theme of some of the associated actions, including marches, petitions and lobbying efforts. This theme has also emerged in a transnational campaign against the Norwegian multinationals that are the dominant actors in the global industrial farming of salmon. Some of these campaigning activities emerge from collaborations between indigenous activists and environmentalists and scientists concerned about the impact of salmon farms, in the Canadian Pacific coast and elsewhere, on depleted stocks of the wild fish. Activists and some scientists assert that the rapid growth of Atlantic salmon aquaculture in this region, along with the long-term deleterious effects of resource extraction and hydro projects on salmon habitats, have contributed to a precipitous decline in numbers of salmon returning to spawn in the rivers that flow into the Pacific. These effects have been so severe that the Canadian government set up a Commission of Inquiry in 2009 to investigate the declining run of salmon in the Fraser River.
