Open net pen fish farms provide ideal conditions for the amplification of parasites and diseases, which has led to widespread crashes of wild fish populations in the north Pacific and Atlantic Oceans. These large-scale drops have, in turn, adversely affected the food chain and impaired the carbon fixing function of the marine ecosystem. Open net pen fish farming therefore plays a critical role in ocean acidification and the climate change crisis.

The Pristine Coast: An Illustrated Screenplay traces the evolution of this problem and explores the public policy decisions taken?-?and not taken?-?that have contributed to the destruction of the marine biological pump and its crucial role in moderating atmospheric greenhouse gases.

The commonly held theory is that commercial fishing was the sole cause of the collapse of the northern Atlantic cod stocks and other key species. Scott Renyard challenges us to look again at this issue and asks, Were diseases introduced and then amplified in open net pen fish farms the real cause of the decline?

Includes an extensive bibliography and over 80 photos in colour and black and white