Why do we need fish farm certifications?
The critical role of Aquaculture certification
Many fish customers often call all kinds of fish as “seafood” in the supermarket. The term seafood roots from the word “sea” and “food.” One can define seafood as any foods originate from the sea. This term, however, seems to homogenize all fish, neglecting the origin of the fish. In reality, the fish we eat come from other waters such as marine, freshwater, and brackish water. Ignoring the fish’s origin may result in mislabeling. That said, one cannot distinguish whether the fish species is red or green labeled fish. In a nutshell, red labeled fish are fish that are prone to extinction due to overfishing. Meanwhile, many seafood NGOs often recommend green labeled fish as they are still under exploitation.
Despite that, harvesting fish from the wild potentially collapses natural fish stock when done unsustainably. That is why in the long term, the world’s population cannot solely rely on the wild capture fisheries. People should find other alternatives for their protein needs. Thanks to aquaculture, now humans can grow fish in a contained water area. Aquaculture is a way of rearing finfish or non-finfish (e.g., shrimps, seaweeds, and shellfish) in an artificial environment. The primary benefit of farming fish is we can control the inputs and the outputs. One can determine the quality and the quantity of feeds and larvae and manage the water quality, including water waste. The closed water system (i.e., RAS or recirculating aquaculture system), for instance, allows farmers to reuse waters from the fish ponds. This entirety contributes to the fish health and continuously produced fish from the farm.
On top of that, cultured fish are the best feed converter in comparison with livestock agriculture. Many current scholars claim that ten kilograms of feeds can produce one kilogram of fish meat. With this feed efficiency, aquaculture may, in the future, provide adequate protein for the world’s growing population.
Although fish farms give a better future to meet global protein needs, arguably, it does not go without consequences. In practice, fish farmers can use antibiotics for their cultured fish. The antibiotic use alone often links to the antibiotic residuals. This chemical agent may threaten both human health and the aquatic environment nearby fish farm operations. Besides, Farmed fish can escape from the fish ponds. The fish escapees can result in other issues such as genetically unstable wild fish population, fish biodiversity loss, and disease transfers. In this matter, aquaculture certifications respond to maintain aquaculture sustainability. Aquaculture certifications have three critical roles in promoting aquaculture sustainability:
Adaptation:
Aquaculture certifications have sustainability indicators to assess fish farms. Meaning that fish farmers should meet these requirements to receive eco-label cultured fish. The fish farm should mitigate environmental impacts such as antibiotic residuals, mangrove deforestations, and nutrient effluents. In addition to that, the recent trends of aquaculture certifications have gone beyond ecological parameters. They take into account social welfare in the aquaculture working environment. A fair wage system and occupational health and safety are among the priorities to ensure that fish are responsibly cultivated. This attempt includes the prevention of forced labor and child worker(s) in fish farms.
Relationality
Aquaculture certifications help fish farmers connect with fish buyers they never met before. When fish farmers receive aquaculture certifications, they can sell their fish overseas. It breaks the barrier to the global fish market. That is why aquaculture certifications have generally become the universal language. It is believed to be the only way to reduce fish farm industry impacts. That said, having the aquaculture certifications expand aquaculture stakeholders’ networks and revenues. It facilitates fish farm owners or investors to get buyers within and beyond the home country where the fish are cultured.
Reflexivity
Current aquaculture certification is reflexive. The assessment criteria are not a rigid and final product but continously under development. To do that, certification auditors progressively report their findings in the field to the aquaculture certification bodies. This information enables certification bodies to evaluate current challenges and opportunities. Given that, they have realized that fish feeds, for instance, determine the sustainability of the aquaculture industries. Fish feed companies rely on fishmeal to produce their fish feeds. Fishmeal is the ground form of small fish caught from fishing activities. The fishmeal use provides adequate protein necessary for cultured fish growth. However, wild capture fisheries catching small fish for the fishmeal are often connected with human slaveries.
Another thought is that using fishmeal contributes to the decline of wild fish population. That is why aquaculture certification bodies, in general, recommend reducing the use of the fishmeal based fish feeds. This advice is an attempt to boost feed company innovations to seek fish meal alternatives. Research has shown that feed companies have now developed insects or plant-based fish feeds to reduce fishmeal dependency.
Here are some takeaways:
Aquaculture certifications have become a new practice. It enhances the progress of aquaculture sustainability and food security. However, in general, fish farmers often complain about the certification assessment cost, which may add operational costs. To convince aquaculture stakeholders, it should require promoting fish farm certification benefits to fish farm actors. Perhaps, with the reflexivity role, certification bodies can be more responsive in addressing high assessment cost problems. The author argues that certification bodies should be more inclusive when it comes to certifying fish farms. That said, the certification bodies should attempt to include intensive and small and medium-sized fish cultivation industries. In doing so, the drive for sustainability can be felt for all aquaculture stakeholders.