'Lough Foyle oyster trestles are breaking no laws' - oyster farmer

Foyle oysters have been very much in the news recently and for the “wrong reasons” according to an Inishowen oyster farmer.

Speaking to the Donegal Live, John Steele, who lives in Moville and is originally from Quigley's Point, said references to “illegal oyster trestles” needed to be corrected.

He explained: “It is not possible for the trestles used by Lough Foyle oyster farmers to be described as 'illegal' because they are breaking no laws.

"It is true they are 'unlicensed' trestles, however, this is not the fault of the oyster farmers. Everyone knows there is a jurisdictional problem on Lough Foyle, one which the oyster farmers would like to see resolved, not least of all because oyster farmers active in the Foyle are at a serious disadvantage when compared to oyster farmers in other parts of Ireland.

“Because the State has not sorted out the jurisdictional dispute over Lough Foyle, oyster farmers here cannot avail of the 40% grant aid currently available to oyster farmers elsewhere in the 26 counties. Everywhere else, oyster farmers receive 40% grant aid for every trestle bag, bungee, tractor and quad they use for aquaculture, as well as the buildings.

“Make no mistake about it, if the jurisdictional dispute in Lough Foyle was sorted out, there would be a lot more aquaculture activity. Other bays, far smaller in area than the Foyle, have many more trestles. The complainers should be careful what they wish for and be happy in the knowledge that their taxes are not paying for what is annoying them,” said Mr Steele.

Elaborating, John Steele said that, in other bays in Ireland, where jurisdiction was not disputed, there were “a lot more” trestles on the foreshore than there were on the Foyle.

He gave the comparison of Dungarvan Bay in County Waterford, which, although smaller than the Foyle, has four times more trestles.

Mr Steele said: “Grant aid is one of the reasons for this. If you are operating on the Foyle, you cannot get grant aid because you cannot get a licence.

“People seem to think that if the Foyle was a 'normal' Lough, if the State owned it, or if England owned it, there would be no trestles. That is not the case, there would still be trestles. There is aquaculture going on in every bay in the country.

“Oyster farmers on Lough Foyle do not have to carry out Environmental Impact Assessments because there is no way of doing them. There is no mechanism. There is no legal framework.

“Lough Foyle oyster farmers do not have to consult with people living near the foreshore either. For example, if you are in Dungarvan Bay, you apply to the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine for an aquaculture licence. If the people on the shore objected, that would not stop the licence being granted. There are probably a lot of things taken into consideration in terms of a decision.”

“For the sake of argument,” added Mr Steele, “if everybody who objected was successful, there would not be a house built in the country, there would not be a trestle in any lough. Just because somebody objects, it does not mean they are right.

“The bottom line of the situation on Lough Foyle is simple. Britain claims the high water mark along the shore and Ireland visa versa, so there is no legal framework.

“The Loughs' Agency has the power to licence Wild Oyster fishing but it does not have any control on the foreshore.

“There should be regulation, although I do not know who the regulator should be. We would then be entitled to the 40% grant aid which aquaculture receives in Carlingford or Bantry Bay. Lough Foyle oyster farmers are at a serious disadvantage.

“The jurisdiction of the Foyle was one of those things that was not sorted out following partition. The main reason why it was not sorted out was because the navigational channel to Derry was on the Donegal side of the lough.

“Carlingford to get sorted because they drew a line down the centre and the navigational channel was on the Northern side. If they drew a line down the middle of the Foyle, Derry City would lose control of their access,” said John Steele
Mr Steele emphasised the water quality in the Foyle was improved by the shellfish.

He said: “Oysters are filter feeders. Every ton of oysters filters and cleans 1.3 million litres of water every twenty four hours. There are actually parts of the world where people are paid to grow oysters just for the purpose of water treatment alone.

“Employment is another major part of the oyster farming business. Up to 300 workers are directly employed on Lough Foyle, from Moville to Culmore, with up to five times that number indirectly supported. In the summertime secondary school pupils would also be employed.

“To my knowledge, it is all local people, people from Muff to Quigley's Point, Clonmany, Carndonagh and Glengad.

“A host of different businesses are also positively supported, including garages, which supply tractor and trailers and all things mechanical; boatbuilders, who supply boats and barges and an ever growing maintenance backup; tyre companies; fuel suppliers; transport; concrete contractors; and many, many more too numerous to mention.

“In fact, we recently got a new boat built in Seabound Engineering in Greencastle. It was launched just last week. The boat is named 'Seabound I' as this was their first build. It is probably the first in Ireland as these boats are normally built in France.

“The amount of money coming into the area is the lifeblood of the whole area. A conservative estimate would put it at €15 million per year, one way and another.

“If a foreign company was to come into the area and generate the same level of investment and employment, it would be in every news outlet in the area.”

Mr Steele added that often “the people who are most against the oyster farming industry are quite happy to take the money generated by it when it arrives at their businesses”.

A lot of oysters from the Foyle go to the French and Dutch markets. However, a growing outlet for Foyle oysters is Asia, with China being a fast-expanding market, according to Mr Steele.

He added: “The Foyle oysters have an excellent shape and good meat content.

“Ireland has a 7,500 kilometre coastline and with the severe problems with fishing quotas, as a result of Brexit, aquaculture is becoming an ever growing and important industry.

“We are well aware there is a lobby of people totally against our business. These are probably the same people, who, when they are out for a meal, order oysters to impress their friends; or the windmill critics who switch on the light first thing when they go home; or the sewerage blockers who flush the toilet and think it is someone else’s problem.

“In relation to the recent criminal damage done to an oyster farmer in Clar, I have been active on the Foyle for over sixty years and I have never seen anything that would come near this ridiculous and downright dangerous act.

“Not only was it a terrible thing to do to the oyster farmer but the danger that it caused was unbelievable. The trestles were pulled out upside down, to deep water, right in the path of all kinds of boating traffic,” said Mr Steele.

The oyster farmer said the abandoned trestles could have “holed and sunk” a passing vessel.

Mr Steele said he was told that Foyle Port would have had to have been closed but for the “gallant effort” of the oyster farmers involved.

“They spent days, at great danger to themselves and their boats, trying to clear the danger.

“If the Coast Guard had been responding to an emergency in the middle of the night, not only could they have been sunk, a volunteer crew person could have been impaled on a metal bar.

“These trestles, before they were moved, were sitting upright, inside of low water and out of the way of boating traffic.”

Mr Steele believes the oyster trestles were not adversely affecting the Lough Foyle ecosystem.

He said: “An awful lot of the migratory birds would be out beside us on the trestles, feeding on seaweed and the material that grows on the bags. The trestles are giving migratory birds, geese and ducks, feeding they did not have before.”