An upcoming inspection trip by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), which plans to test Chilean farmed salmon, is set to take place take place this coming April 20.

The date was confirmed this week by the daily La Tercera, which quoted Chilean Ambassador to the United States Mariano Fernández as saying “we’ll soon have information from the FDA that we can use to counter the New York Times information.”

“If it turns out there’s something true in all this, then Chile can fix it,” Fernández added.

The visit – which FDA press officer Stephanie Kwisnek describes as “an inspection trip…to assess the country’s overall controls of chemotherapeutic residues in aquacultured products exported to the United States” – comes in the wake of a scathing article published last week by the influential New York Times.

Entitled “Salmon Virus Indicts Chile’s Fishing Methods,” the New York Times article highlights the industry’s current struggles with Infectious Salmon Anemia (ISA) and raises serious questions about Chilean aquaculture practices, suggesting among other things that producers here may overuse antibiotics. ISA is a highly contagious virus that can be lethal to fish but does not affect humans. The story also alludes to the use in Chile of growth hormones. First published last week, the article has since appeared in major newspapers throughout the United States.

The New York Times story prompted Safeway, one of the largest food retailers in the United States, to reduce its purchases of Chilean salmon. Overall Chile sells approximately US$700 million worth of salmon annually to the United States. Safeway buys a relatively small portion of that – about US$12 million worth. Still, the move threatens to set a costly precedent, especially if other U.S. chains such as Wal-Mart or Costco are to follow suit (PT, April 2).

SalmonChile, the country’s private producers association, insists its producers use no such hormones. The trade group also claims that while Chilean salmon farms employ more antibiotics than their counterparts in Norway – the world’s leading salmon producer – their use is by no means “excessive.”

This “attack,” according to SalmonChile President César Barros, “is part of a long campaign by environmental organizations who use language that discredits us without offering any suggestions about how things might be done differently…In the long run, (their campaign) represents a potential danger not just for us, but for the entire export industry.”

Barros says he welcomes the upcoming FDA visit. “It’s the best news we’ve heard,” the SalmonChile head told the Patagonia Times.

“We trust the FDA and the FDA trusts us. If you look at the New York Times article, the part where we come out looking best is precisely the bit where it says (the FDA) routinely inspects shipments of Chilean salmon and that they’ve never found any traces or residues of prohibited chemicals. And so I hope they come soon,” he said.

By Benjamin Witte ( This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it )