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With the impending shortage of fish meal and fish oil used in aquaculture, the industry needs to look to alternatives.

Usually low value “trash fish” are the main source of these resources and not only used in aquaculture but in  feeding other animals and occasioanally in human food.

Rather than acquiring new food sources such as algae, insects and plants, perhaps aquaculture should look towards producing these lower quality fish alongside their higher value stocks. By developing onsite processing methods, lower quality fish could be used as feed for higher value fish as well as for feeding non aquatic food animals. This presents an opportunity for aquaculture to target a wider range of markets from traditional agriculture through to human consumption, while simultaneously sustaining itself.

The global aquaculture industry currently accounts for over 45% of all seafood consumed.

That figure has been projected to increase to 75% over the next 20 years. While the industry is truly on a dynamic growth path, it is nonetheless dangerously dependent upon fishmeal as a key protein constituent in fish and shrimp diets.

The aquaculture industry is not alone however, as cattle, poultry, pig and other intensive forms of animal production use fishmeal as a primary protein source in their diets. Currently ten countries produce 80% of all world fishmeal supply, and three of those suppliers are net importers of product, thereby reducing supply, not increasing it. These include the U.S. and China.

Fishmeal production reached heights of 4.4 million tonnes in 2002 and was consistently above 3.3 million tonnes between 2001 and 2005. A report providing the details may be reviewed here.

Production of fishmeal also decreased 20% in 2006, and prices rose from USD $750/metric tonne to over USD $1400/metric tonne. In 2007 it failed to exceed 2000 tonnes. Is this just a blip or is the downturn in production aligned with other trends? U.S. growers experienced four feed price increases within a 16 month period.

A staggering 25% of all world fish production goes into the low value added pursuits of fishmeal and fish oil production!

Due to the fact that the regions responsible for the majority of world supply are isolated geographically from major markets, every tonne of fishmeal travels an average of 5000 km before it reaches the end user. Obviously, particularly in the face of the present oil crisis, this has enormous economic implications for global intensive animal protein production markets.

As far as aquaculture is concerned, clearly the future demand for fishmeal is on a rapidly increasing track. With world fish stocks, and baitfish stocks in particular, in decline, the stage is set for a bottleneck that could severely limit industry growth.

In order to head off such a bottleneck, the global aquaculture industry must eliminate its dependence upon fishmeal (and fish oil) and develop a portfolio of sustainable dietary protein sources.

The very industry that has been called upon to bridge the gap between demand and wild supply is now dependent upon wild stocks of fish for the vast majority of its protein source .

In order to expand and succeed in the future, the industry must develop its independence from fishmeal and wild sources of feed.

As a theme, the Finfish blog has carried an array of postings about using ‘lower forms’ of life as dietary inputs. Diet ingredients must be produced from sustainable sources to allow the unhindered expansion of global seafood production.

What are other ways in which this problem might be countered? Lets think outside the square on this one!

Key criteria to consider as innovation drivers are as follows:

• maximise capacity for local production
• maximise capacity to meet volume requirements
• minimise cost of production
• maximise ease of handling feed input
• minimise flavour impact

What are the other criteria we must include?

Our colleagues in Norway recently renewed their commitment to invest in strategic Aquaculture Industry development by announcing further support for their Aquaculture – An Industry in Growth (HAVBRUK) program.

There are some important thoughts highlighted within their planning document that are well worth highlighting to the Finfish community. We should seek to build upon an extend some of these thoughts as part of our work to address the global fish production gap.

In this post I provide an introduction to the program and in subsequent posts I plan to highlight some of the key points for consideration. These points are specifically worth considering in the context of our forthcoming Innovation Roadmapping efforts the key aquaculture challenges already highlighted through this web site.

The primary objectives of the Norwegian program is to create knowledge as the basis of a profitable and value-creating aquaculture industry. The program seeks to employ sustainable, market-oriented production, and to ensure that the Norwegian aquaculture industry develops knowledge of a high international standard in areas crucial to the industry’s advancement.

The HAVBRUK program encompasses the production of salmonids and other species through the entire value chain, including parts of catch-based aquaculture and sea ranching and the market for lightly processed products.

The programme is targeted toward all aspects of the aquaculture industry, including the supplier industry and various customer groups, research institutes, universities and university colleges. Government authorities are also an important target group , as they are responsible for resource management and for laying the foundation for industry development within the sector.

To improve the industry’s profitability, the program indicates that more attention must be paid to learning about how the markets function. The aquaculture industry needs to be developed within a framework that focuses attention on factors such as food safety and the nutritional requirements of consumers, while being based on sustainable processes that incorporate considerations pertaining to the environment, animal welfare and feed resources.

Greater focus on the market by industrial and research circles should come in addition to, not at the expense of, research efforts in biology and technology for optimising production processes.

Aquaculture is an international industry with respect to ownership, markets, customers and suppliers of knowledge, products and services. It follows, then, that aquaculture research must be put into an international context. The development of an industry-based knowledge culture, in which industry players actively participate in and contribute to regional, national and international innovations systems, will be critical. The public authorities will also need to enhance their knowledge to be able to deal with the management aspects of a growing aquaculture industry.

The HAVBRUK website contains some important documents and content (in english) that is likely to be influential in how we shape our thinking.

OCEAN industry representatives from around the world will meet in New York later this month to work together on tackling shared marine environmental challenges.

The inaugural meeting of the World Ocean Council will bring together business community members interested in developing an unprecedented collaborative approach toward improving the health of the marine environment.

Representatives from the shipping, oil and gas, fisheries, cruise ship tourism, aquaculture, ports and other ocean industries are expected to attend.

The workshop will be kicked off by Georg Kell, executive director of the United Nations Global Compact and Vaclav Mikulka, director of the United Nations Division of Ocean Affairs and Law of the Sea.

“The world’s oceans are at risk. The health of the seas depends on developing a more comprehensive approach to sustainability and stewardship by business.

“A growing number of companies are trying to be responsible, but collective efforts beyond those of a few companies, or even a whole sector, are needed to address the combined effects on the global ocean ecosystem,” said Paul Holthus, executive director of the World Ocean Council.

The phenomenal growth of shipping, oil and gas, fisheries, cruise tourism, aquaculture and other ocean uses is reportedly resulting in cumulative impacts to the marine environment, possibly also affecting the ocean’s crucial role in regulating climate.

“If we are thinking globally, oceanically and collectively, rather than considering our own narrow industry requirements, the World Ocean Council could be a very good idea,” noted Michael Grey from Lloyd’s List, an international maritime news report.

To address this challenge, the World Ocean Council is creating a coalition of ocean industries to:

• Catalyse collaborative science to find solutions to shared marine environmental issues.
• Organise industry working groups to constructively engage with other ocean stakeholders.
• Develop sustainability standards, marine footprint reporting, and ocean stewardship strategies.
• Facilitate interaction among sectors to reduce ocean use conflicts.

The World Ocean Council will convene ocean industry sustainability leaders on June 24 and June 25 2008.

Glenn Schipp, Aquaculture Manager at the Darwin Aquaculture Centre has recently released a paper debating the sustainability of using fishmeal and fish oil as aquaculture feed components.

The paper covers issues such as the feed conversion rates in farmed fish, the impact on the ecosystem of removing large quantities of small fish and the farming of carnivorous vs omnivorous or herbivorous fish species. Some misconceptions surrounding these issues are also highlighted in the paper.

For further information on this topic, please see the attached paper:

Is the Use of Fishmeal and Fish Oil in Aquaculture Diets Sustainable?