This is where the first dollars enter, that support numerous other businesses.<\/p>\n
Now the Task Force warns about the economic consequences of phasing out fish farms.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
![\"Campbell](\"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/Screen-Shot-2021-01-24-at-4.59.25-PM.png\")
<\/a>Click here to access the report<\/a><\/p><\/div>\n In a news release called \u2018Wake Up Campbell River,\u2019 they state:<\/p>\n \u201c<\/em>Whether you agree or disagree with the decision of the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, it is important, we think, that each member of the community is fully informed about what this industry contributes directly and indirectly in cash input to Campbell River and how the other local business are connected to the salmon farming industry and what may be lost if this industry either fully or partially retreats from the current scope of its business.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201d \u2026 The fish farming industry has, unlike many other businesses, been virtually unaffected by the pandemic and has continued production at near normal levels and has been deemed \u201cessential\u201d during the COVID-19 pandemic. In the past, many of the job losses associated with the closure of the\u00a0Elk Falls Mill<\/a>, were absorbed at the time by an expanding aquaculture industry. We don\u2019t see such a fall-back position being available to those workers who will lose their jobs as a result of the closure of the Discovery Islands salmon farms.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIf you look at the interrelationships, you can see that so many things that we enjoy in this community, and on your own island (Cortes) to some extent, are a product of a successful forest industry, aquaculture industry, and, when it\u2019s able to, the contribution made by tourism and hospitality,\u201d said Task Force Co-Chair Brian Stamp.<\/p>\n from the Report of the Campbell River Business Recovery Task Force<\/p><\/div><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n \u201cIt is important to recognize that both forestry and aquaculture have largely been spared the devastation from the COVID pandemic that has been heaped upon the tourism sector, including facilities and businesses operated by First Nations. At the time of this report, the expectation is that this sector will not recover to what was \u201cnormal\u201d for between 3 and 5 years. The initiative to \u201cvisit our own province\u201d being promoted by the Province has produced some positive short term results but is not expected to sustain the industry over the long term.\u201d \u2013\u00a0Report of the Campbell River Business Recovery Task Force<\/a><\/p>\n \u201cThe forestry sector is more diverse. We never did get a clear picture because there are probably 20 contract logging companies in town, so we just settled on four, \u201dexplained Stamp.<\/p>\n They also worked with a license holder, who has remained anonymous.<\/p>\n \u201cIn aggregate: these four companies and the individual licence holder employ some 500 persons, pay annually an estimated $47 million in wages and benefits to employees who reside in Campbell River. These same companies purchase conservatively some $77 million in supplies and services from vendors located in Campbell River,\u201d said Stamp.<\/p>\n He added, \u201cAfter we published the report, the BC Council of Forest Industries published its own report called the\u00a02019 Regional Supply Chain Study<\/a>. The report concluded that the supply chain purchases from Campbell River suppliers amounted to $253 million in 2019.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWe had a very clear message from the aquaculture business because they are all tied together with the\u00a0BC Salmon Farmers Association<\/a>,\u201d said Stamp.<\/p>\n He cited statistics from the BC Salmon Farmer\u2019s Association report, Raising Opportunity: How BC Salmon could lead BC\u2019s Post COVID Recovery<\/a>\u00a0where it says there 572 people from Campbell River, Sayward and the Discovery Islands employed in salmon farm operations. They receive $31 million in wages and another $132.6 million goes out to local venders.<\/p>\n \u201cIf you take the supply chain numbers from the aquaculture industry and forestry industry and add them up, that\u2019s a significant amount of money. Then, if we are lucky enough to get the tourism component back on its feet, then you have the three pillars firing on all cylinders,\u201d said Stamp.<\/p>\n \u201cThe retail opportunities that we have in Campbell River, the big box stores \u2013 the Walmarts, Home Depots, Home Hardware, Save on Foods, those large retail operations \u2013 are a product of Campbell River having a resilient economy. If all of a sudden the traffic in Home Depot was to suffer because the numbers of people shopping there are reduced, because their incomes are reduced, or the numbers of people available to shop are reduced because they haven\u2019t got a job and they\u2019ve moved on \u2013 guess what. If that store isn\u2019t producing the results that they expect, it will close,\u201d said Stamp.<\/p>\n \u201cThat goes for all the other things that we enjoy here and the residents of\u00a0Quadra<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Cortes Islands<\/a>\u00a0enjoy some of the same benefits. We have a very wonderful array of physicians, and surgeons in Campbell River. We have a new hospital in Campbell River. Those are all products of having a group of citizens that have the where withal because they have jobs and are well paid to live here.\u201d<\/p>\n Stamp concluded, \u201cYou can see small communities that are not successful. They struggle to keep doctors in their communities. So we are fortunate that these industries [tourism, forestry and fish farms] have provided us with a very nice way of life.\"<\/p>\n This article was published January 25th, with additional information and edits to the first paragraph on Jan 26th, 2021.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" By Roy L Hales When\u00a0Campbell River\u00a0was reeling from the onset of\u00a0COVID\u00a0last Spring, a volunteer task force was formed to study the economic impacts. They received responses from about 300 businesses, 30 of which were interviewed over a two and a half month period. The\u00a0Campbell River Business Recovery Task Force\u00a0concluded that the city\u2019s economy primarily rests…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":34,"featured_media":34724,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[217],"tags":[368,5280],"radio":[252],"origine":[280,266,231],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34707"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/34"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34707"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34707\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/34724"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34707"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34707"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34707"},{"taxonomy":"radio","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/radio?post=34707"},{"taxonomy":"origine","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canada-info.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/origine?post=34707"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}'Wake up Campbell River'<\/h2>\n
Campbell River\u2019s three pillars<\/h2>\n
![\"The](\"https:\/\/cortescurrents.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/Three-pillars.png\")
Tourism<\/h2>\n
Forestry<\/h2>\n
Fish farms<\/h2>\n
Stores and Services<\/h2>\n
Importance of the three economic pillars<\/h2>\n