Norwegian fishing ministry: "Right, so, this law says that you're not allowed to dump your delousing chemicals within 500 meters of natural spawning grounds."
Norwegian fish farming: "Well, I disagree with your interpretation of the law."
Norwegian fishing ministry: "Oh, okay."
So apparently, fish farms have been dumping their chemicals, predominantly hydrogen peroxide, either in close proximity to or in some cases directly inside of wild spawning grounds, resulting in lots of fuckery including large numbers of shrimp, lobster and krill washing up dead on the shore. This has been going on quite some time, and some of the excuses from this (Norwegian)
article are pretty hilarious... When asked about some of the dumping, one of the largest fish farming companies, Marine Harvest, simply said "We disagree with the fishing ministry's interpretation of fishing laws", saying that "Spawning grounds" and "Spawning areas" are completely different terms, and that the law only covers
grounds specifically. So dumping within spawning
areas is fine, until such a time as the law gets changed.
Now, there's a nugget of truth in there, as "Spawning ground" is a specific term used within the scientific field responsible for defining these boundaries... But it's still pretty sleazy to just say "Yeah, you caught us, but we're not changing until you push a new law with different semantics through".
Other excuses from illegal dumpers include: "The law is too confusing to read" and "Well I
told the boat not to dump in that area, but they just wouldn't listen! What can ya do?"
No fines or legal actions have been leveled against the dumpers despite in some cases very clearly breaking the law, but apparently there have been a few internal procedure changes that just coincidentally happened to be enacted right after the news agency came snooping around and asking questions.
In a completely unrelated aside, the spokesperson for one of the companies that directly admitted to dumping in illegal zones has recently been elected to the position of Minister of Fisheries.
Go to a bricklayer for advice on building houses, go to a jeweler on advice on appraising jewels.
And go to a conman for advice on politics?