A United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) report entitled 'Aquaculture in the Third Millennium,' released recently indicates fish farming is expected to boost food fish supplies worldwide over the next 20 years, helping to reduce poverty and food insecurity.
The report says that aquaculture's contribution towards global fisheries landings continues to grow, dominating all other animal food producing sectors. The percentage of seafood from wild fisheries is decreasing, and fish farming is the source of an increasing percentage of seafood in the US and worldwide.
Aquaculture production in the US is more than 400,000 metric tonne of fish and shellfish, worth US $729 million. In Japan, aquaculture has undergone major changes. It has moved to large-scale commercial farming. In the past few years, the sector's contribution to aquatic food production has increased, too, the report finds.
The document takes a positive stand on fish farming despite environmentalists' concern that fish escaping from net pens contaminate the wild fish gene pool, and that fish waste contaminates the ocean floor beneath the pens with chemicals fed to keep the fish healthy.
It says sustainable use of aquatic resources can only be achieved through "vigorous and combined efforts by all sectors involved: farmers' cooperatives and agencies, regulators, policymakers, scientists, non-governmental organisations and other aquatic resource-users."
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