Fish welfare Project

Fish welfare

The definition of fish welfare can be described as follows: the state of the individual as it copes with the environment. This definition of welfare has several implications: 

  • Welfare is a characteristic of an animal, not something that is given to it;
  • Welfare will vary from very poor to very good, i.e. the individual may be in a poor state at one end of the welfare continuum or in a good state at the other,
  • Welfare can be measured objectively and independently of moral considerations;
  • Measures of failure to cope and measures of how difficult it is for an animal to cope both give information about how poor the welfare is;
  • Knowledge of the preferences of an animal often gives valuable information about what conditions are likely to result in good welfare, but direct measurements of the state of the animal must also be used in attempts to assess welfare and improve it;
  • Animals may use a variety of methods when trying to cope.

Aquaculture or the farming of aquatic organisms including fish, molluscs and crustaceans, implies some sort of intervention in the rearing process in order to enhance production, for example regular stocking, feeding, protection from predators etc. It is for this reason therefore that the issue of fish welfare is an important and current concern and fish welfare can be measured using a number of fish welfare indicators. In 2017 Friend of the Sea started a collaboration with a Swiss research group, Fair Fish, which, thanks to a generous funding from Open Philanthropy, launched the fish welfare initiative – a scientific research project whose aim was to improve fish welfare.

To carry out this project, Friend of the Sea organised field visits by researchers to its certified farms for aquaculture products, where researchers collected and analysed data on farms, and extrapolated the parameters that were finally used to create 24 species-specific checklists.

The scientific approach, the field visits and the invaluable support of the Friend of the Sea certified companies were fundamental in achieving this goal.

Friend of the Sea will shortly begin the revision process to approve these new checklists.

Any stakeholder is invited to provide comments during this incoming revision process.