Story of a Shellfish Farmers Co-operative

Shellfish co-operatives can have a significant positive economic and social influence on coastal communities without a negative environmental impact. Firstly, they can address the concerns that neighbours have about development by keeping control and access to local resources in local hands. They can also help their neighbourhoods by providing employment, particularly for women; flexible, local work rather than camp work that is supportive of family life. Women, including First Nations women, in fact, have always been involved in the industry, especially in the processing end of the business. Thus it is not surprising that, in the 70's and 80's, women started applying for tenures in order to run their own farms. Co-ops also facilitate the sharing of marine resource: for example, Shellfish Growers Co-operative has at least 20 families utilizing one bay, meaning that the other 19 bays can be left wild or for other uses. They also fit well into the community in the sense that many skills learned in logging and in fishing can be easily transferred to the shellfish industry.