A Richmond, British Columbia, company that claims to sell only sustainable and legal seafood says it is the innocent victim of a dispute between first nations and the federal department of fisheries and oceans.
Jason Ogilvie, president of Pasco Seafood Enterprises, said in an interview Monday his company took all the appropriate steps last summer to ensure its purchase of salmon in a native seine fishery in Johnstone Strait was legitimate.
“We feel everything was done correctly, and DFO has said as much to us,” he said. “We’ve been very cooperative, we’ve done our due diligence. We’re not trying to hide anything by any means.”
The Vancouver Sun revealed Saturday that federal fisheries officers on 8 August seized 31 totes of salmon from Pasco, alleging it was unlawfully caught in a first nations fishery in Johnstone Strait. The salmon was sold for CAD 90,000, money that remains the subject of an ongoing legal dispute between Pasco and the federal government.
Click here to read the full story from The Vancouver Sun >
Click here to read a letter to the editor submitted by Pasco Seafood to SeafoodSource on Tuesday >
