Salmon pioneer Linda Sams leaves Cermaq

She announced earlier this year that she had decided to step down after some 36 years in the business. She had been with Cermaq Canada for the past seven years and her most recent job was as Sustainable Development Director.

Sams has enjoyed a long and distinguished career working in both Canada and, with Tassal, in Australia.

She has been leading Cermaq Canada’s Environment and Sustainable Development team since 2018, overseeing environmental management, corporate social responsibility, and stakeholder engagement.

Growing up on a Canadian cattle farm, aquaculture was probably a long way from her mind when she began her career as a marine biologist working on environmental toxicology.

She was attracted to the work through the example of the French marine explorer Jacques Cousteau who was proposing the farming of oceans. This eventually led her on to taking part in mariculture courses on the growing of finfish, shellfish and seaweed.

Sams joined Mowi (when it was Marine Harvest) and later worked at the British Columbia Centre for Aquatic Health Sciences.

She has also worked with some of Canada’s leading aquaculture related organisations and currently serves on the boards of the Canadian Aquaculture Industry Alliance and the BC provincial advisory committee on ocean hypoxia.

Cermaq, which is owned by the Japanese industrial group Mitsubishi, has yet to announce a successor.