Imports, disease and biosecurity in relation to Atlantic salmon and salmon farming: EIR release

Information requested

Information relating to the subject area of ‘imports, disease and biosecurity’ in relation to Atlantic salmon and salmon farming. The questions posed and information requested covered a number of areas including, import notifications, refusals to allow imports, authorisations associated with Aquaculture Production Businesses, bio-security measures plans and information on discussions concerning disease risks associated with importing countries. The request asked for information since 1 January 2020. The full details of your request are replicated within the response section of this reply.

We contacted you on 23 February 2022 to confirm that, with the respect to the aspect of your request concerning notifications of import, you required copies of all notification forms, explaining that summary information is available as an alternative. You requested copies of all notifications.

1) Notifications by importers or consignees of ova, parr, smolts and any other salmon products to the Fish Health Inspectorate under the Trade in Animals and Related Products (Scotland) regulations 2012.

2) Refusals and any other correspondence in relation to cases where “the consignment fails to meet the health standards”.

3) Authorizations to farm (under the 2009 Regulations, Aquaculture Production Businesses) “where it is considered that the operation of the business will not lead to an unacceptable risk of spreading disease” including the “specific conditions of operation” and “the requirement for the business to follow good bio-security practice”.

4) Biosecurity Measures Plans for salmon farms and hatcheries which may detail “disinfection of ova to reduce the risks from horizontal transmission of pathogens and disease” and “the initial isolation of new stocks brought on site as a precautionary disease control measure”.

5) ‘..Information since 1 January 2020 on “internal discussions” concerning disease risks in Iceland, Norway, Ireland and any other countries in relation to salmon farming. To include:

• emails, letters and any other correspondence with officials in Iceland, Norway, Ireland and any other countries in relation to information and assurances “over any risk posed to Scotland from this trade”.
• any information confirming the location of the outbreak in Iceland, the actions taken in Iceland, the epidemiological separation of the positive site to those sites exporting aquatic animals, as well as confirmation of the disease free status of exporting sites.
• correspondence with Icelandic officials, EFTA and any other parties that “resulted in the conclusion that trade with appropriate certification could continue as it would not pose a significant risk to the introduction of ISAv into Scotland”.
• any Cabinet Briefings on ISA in Iceland and any disease risks posed to Scotland.

Response

As the information you have requested is 'environmental information' for the purposes of the Environmental Information (Scotland) Regulations 2004 (EIRs), we are required to deal with your request under those Regulations. We are applying the exemption at section 39(2) of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 (FOISA), so that we do not also have to deal with your request under FOISA.

This exemption is subject to the 'public interest test'. Therefore, taking account of all the circumstances of this case, we have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exemption, because there is no public interest in dealing with the same request under two different regimes. This is essentially a technical point and has no material effect on the outcome of your request.

In accordance with regulation 7 of the EIRs, on 9 March 2022 we informed you that we extended the time scale for dealing with your request by 20 working days. This was undertaken on the basis that the request was both complex and voluminous making it impractical to issue a response within the original deadline.

Your request comprised of the following five sections seeking information on each. Responses to each are provided below. Where exceptions are applied this is referenced and further information is provided following the response to all sections of the request.

1) Notifications by importers or consignees of ova, parr, smolts and any other salmon products to the Fish Health Inspectorate under the Trade in Animals and Related Products (Scotland) regulations 2012.
The response releases copies of all notifications held with respect to the time scale of the request. Regulation 11(2) of the EIRs (personal information) has been applied to this part of the request. Please be aware that the Scottish Government may not hold a comprehensive record of import notifications in relation to your request. There is legal requirement for stakeholders to report such information directly through the computer information management system (IPAFFS) (administered outwith Scottish Government) or directly to the Border Control Post, as opposed to informing the Scottish Government.

2) Refusals and any other correspondence in relation to cases where “the consignment fails to meet the health standards”.
Regulation 10(4)(a) of the EIRs (information not held) is applied to this part of the request. There have been no refusals of consignments and no consignments which have ‘failed to meet the health standards’ in relation to this request. Responses to previous requests, for example FoI/18/01553 and FoI/18/03773, have provided detailed context of the measures in place which help to ensure the safe trade in live aquatic animal products and these principles still apply. Responses to requests for information are published on the Scottish Government’s website:

https://www.gov.scot/publications/

3) Authorizations to farm (under the 2009 Regulations, Aquaculture Production Businesses) “where it is considered that the operation of the business will not lead to an unacceptable risk of spreading disease” including the “specific conditions of operation” and “the requirement for the business to follow good bio-security practice”.
The details of all authorised Aquaculture Production Businesses (APB) are published in the internetbased register: https://www.gov.scot/publications/registers-of-authorised-aquaculture-productionbusinesses-and-authorised-processing-establishments/

With respect to your request, ova and packaging disinfection are common conditions across all APB authorisations relating to finfish farming operations and extracted text from such documents, found at sections 9 and 10 of the authorisation certificate, reads as follows:

Section 9 of the authorisation conditions states that: The operator of the APB must ensure that any consignment of aquaculture animal ova introduced from outwith Scotland is disinfected on arrival at the site of destination(6) before being laid down. All salmonid ova introduced from outwith Scotland must be disinfected in accordance with Chapter 4.4 of the Aquatic Animal Health Code published by the World Organisation for Animal Health. A reference to this document is provided below:

http://www.oie.int/index.php?id=171&L=0&htmfile=chapitre_disinfection_eggs.htm

For other species, preliminary tests should be conducted, seeking veterinary advice where necessary, to determine at what ova stage and disinfectant concentration, disinfection can be carried out safely for the required contact time.

6 “Site of destination” means the first site where the ova will be laid down in Scottish waters.

Section 10 of the authorisation conditions states that: Having had regard to the Fisheries Research Services Internal Report 13/06: ‘Disinfection guide version IV: practical steps to prevent the introduction and minimise transmission of diseases of fish’(7) the operator of the APB must ensure that all packaging materials used in relation to the introduction of aquaculture animal ova consignments from outwith Scotland are effectively disinfected before disposal to prevent the introduction of, and to minimise the transmission of, diseases of fish.’

7 Please refer to the Fisheries Research Services Internal Report 13/06: ‘Disinfection guide version IV: practical steps to prevent the introduction and minimise transmission of diseases of fish’ which can be obtained at https://www.gov.scot/publications/fish-diseases-disinfection-guide-iv/ or by contacting the Fish Health Inspectorate.

4) Biosecurity Measures Plans for salmon farms and hatcheries which may detail “disinfection of ova to reduce the risks from horizontal transmission of pathogens and disease” and “the initial isolation of new stocks brought on site as a precautionary disease control measure”.

The Scottish Government does not routinely hold copies of Biosecurity Measures Plans (BMP). These documents are inspected as part of the aquatic animal disease surveillance programme to ensure that they are fit for purpose and are being implemented on site. Comments made, in this regard, are detailed within the results of any given inspection where these documents and practices have been assessed. We may also look at these documents as part of the business authorisation process, but as detailed above copies are not routinely maintained.

The Scottish Government does hold one copy of a BMP relating to Organic Sea Harvest (FB0579), which details the quarantine of livestock by following sections 3.28, 3.29, and 3.30 of Chapter 4 of the industry’s Code of Good Practice. This extracted information represents all the information held by the Scottish Government in relation to this part of the request. The BMP itself, relating to Organic Sea Harvest, may have subsequently been updated, and the information provided may not now be indicative of the current, operational BMP for the authorised business.

The minimum requirements for a BMP are detailed on the Scottish Government website:

https://www.gov.scot/publications/biosecurity-measures-plan-2/

5) ‘Information since 1 January 2020 on “internal discussions” concerning disease risks in Iceland, Norway, Ireland and any other countries in relation to salmon farming. To include:

• emails, letters and any other correspondence with officials in Iceland, Norway, Ireland and any other countries in relation to information and assurances “over any risk posed to Scotland from this trade”.
• any information confirming the location of the outbreak in Iceland, the actions taken in Iceland, the epidemiological separation of the positive site to those sites exporting aquatic animals, as well as confirmation of the disease free status of exporting sites.
• correspondence with Icelandic officials, EFTA and any other parties that “resulted in the conclusion that trade with appropriate certification could continue as it would not pose a significant risk to the introduction of ISAv into Scotland”.
• any Cabinet Briefings on ISA in Iceland and any disease risks posed to Scotland.

We have provided relevant communications relating to this part of your request. These are mainly focused on discussions relating to Norway and Iceland. With respect to Norway, email communications relate to the temporary suspension of trade from Norway, and the subsequent reinstatement of specific areas considered safe to resume trading. With respect to Iceland, communications relate to a recent discovery of ISAv at a seawater farm site and the confirmation that the proposed trade in Atlantic salmon ova was able to resume due to the epidemiological separation between the infected site and sites trading in ova. Information on these subject areas, which has already been the subject of an information request, and has been released, can be located through appropriate searching on the Scottish Government webpage - https://www.gov.scot/publications/.

This response also releases an excel spreadsheet ‘imports of salmon 01/01/20 to 09/02/22’. This largely contains information which has been previously released but has been amended slightly to remove some duplicate entries which were included erroneously.

Copyright applies
Some of the information supplied to you, in particular documentation relating to the OiE, continues to be protected by the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. You are free to use it for your own purposes, including any non-commercial research you are doing and for the purposes of news reporting. Any other re-use, for example commercial publication, would require the permission of the copyright holder. Most documents supplied by the Scottish Government will have been produced by government officials and will be Crown Copyright. You can find details on the arrangements for re-using Crown Copyright material on the National Archives website at:

http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3/

Information you receive which is not subject to Crown Copyright continues to be protected by the copyright of the person, or organization, from which the information originated. You must ensure that you gain their permission before reproducing any third party (non Crown Copyright information).

Regulations and exceptions apply
While our aim is to provide information whenever possible, in this instance we are unable to provide some of the information you have requested because exceptions under the regulations apply. These have been referred to above with respect to the various responses to each aspect of this request. Further explanation and justification on the application of the exceptions is given below.

An exception under regulation 11(2) of the EIRs (personal information) applies to some of the information requested because it is personal data of a third party and disclosing it would contravene the data protection principles in Article 5(1) of the General Data Protection Regulation and in section 34(1) of the Data Protection Act 2018. This includes, although is not exclusive to, names, telephone numbers, email addresses and job titles of individuals. This exception is not subject to the 'public interest test', so we are not required to consider if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exception.

An exception under regulation 10(4)(e) of the EIRs (internal discussions) applies to some of the information you have requested. This relates to internal discussions between Scottish Government officials with respect to the development of both responses to media queries and the development of ministerial submissions to update Ministers of specific situations.

This exception is subject to the 'public interest test'. Therefore, taking account of all the circumstances of this case, we have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exception. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exception. We recognise that there is some public interest in release because this shows the working and thinking of officials within Scottish Government. However, this is outweighed by the public interest in protecting the space for Scottish Government officials to have free thinking, open and frank discussions relating to the development of responses. This is further supported by the fact that the final or most advanced versions of these responses, as held by the Scottish Government, are released as part of the response.

Under the terms of the exception at regulation 10(4)(a) of the EIRs (information not held), the Scottish Government is not required to provide information which it does not have. The Scottish Government does not hold information on refusals of consignments or information on consignments which have failed to meet the health standards, as neither situation applies to the time scale and scope of your request.

This exception is subject to the 'public interest test'. Therefore, taking account of all the circumstances of this case, we have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exception. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exception. While we recognise that there may be some public interest in information about refusals of consignments or information on consignments which have failed to meet the required health standards, clearly we cannot provide information which we do not hold.

Some of the information you have requested is available from publicly available information sources. These have been detailed and provided throughout the response. Under regulation 6(1)(b) of the EIRs, we do not have to give you information which is already publicly available and easily accessible to you in another form or format. If, however, you do not have internet access to obtain this information from the website(s) listed, then please contact me again and I will send you a paper copy.

In addition some information which is considered out of scope of the request has been redacted and removed from the information being released.

Due to the size of the files we are unable to upload the documents referred to above. If you wish to consider, please contact us at the address below and we will be happy to provide.

About FOI

The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at http://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.