Alaska Chided Over Fishing Pact

Alaska’s refusal to sign a salmon agreement with Canada could trigger a consumer boycott of salmon, Canadian Fisheries Minister Brian Tobin says.

“I think, quite frankly, that the Alaskans are taking a tremendous risk here,” Tobin said Monday from Ottawa. “We saw the tremendous power of those who care about conservation when it is unleashed in the cause of conservation in the context of the controversy that grew up around Clayoquot Sound.”

He was referring to European consumer actions against British Columbia forest products after the provincial government permitted harvesting of old-growth timber in the Clayoquot region on western Vancouver Island in 1993.

Tobin’s comments came after Canadian fishing boats swarmed around an Alaska state ferry Sunday, delaying it from docking in Prince Rupert, British Columbia, for more than three hours.

The boats surrounded the ferry Taku to demonstrate their anger over Alaska’s opposition to an interim salmon fishing agreement that would cut the Southeast Alaska chinook harvest by 40 percent.