The Journal of the World Aquaculture Society released last month a comprehensive review and trajectory of the aquaculture sector which looks at new approaches toward sustainable intensive aquaculture production systems. In the chapter dedicated to feeds, Albert G. J. Tacon stresses that among selection criteria now being considered by many aquaculture producing countries and consumers “sustainability of use of feed ingredient production, including specific considerations related to feed and food safety (i.e., use of genetically modified feed ingredients, terrestrial ruminant meals, potential feed adulterants, etc.), environmental footprint, and possible import dependency and food security concerns” are becoming important in addition to nutrient level, nutrient digestibility and cost related criteria.

These considerations are welcomed especially since they differentiate between three distinct categories: environmental footprint, food security and food safety, which are often intertwined but might also contradict themselves at some point. Environmental footprint and food safety both rely on research and decades of knowledge so that claims can be supported by scientific evidence. The European Food Safety Authority explains that new materials or methods have to undergo risk assessments against very precise criteria. Before food is traded within the EU from outside the EU, the EFSA ensures that it has been consumed safely for at least 25 years. The process applied to the production of marine ingredients is highly natural (cooking, pressing, drying) and the industry has been focusing on increasing the use of by-products resulting from fish processing, which already reaches a 33% share. Bearing this in mind, and with the inputs from research papers, we are confident that the marine ingredients industry’s environmental footprint is much better than other feed ingredient sectors.

Now, what about food security? It is about ensuring a sufficient supply of nutritious food to a growing population worldwide. This challenge is about quantity and quality. Although global population growth is projected to slow by 2030 it will still result in an estimated 1.3 billion more people which is a 19% increase from 2014, according to the FAO.

As fishmeal and fish oil are widely used as benchmarks in the feed industry, it is largely because of their unmatched nutritional and technical properties as well as being important performance factor in the feed industry. Fishmeal and fish oil provides a steady supply of at average 6 million tonnes each year (5 million tonnes fishmeal and 1 million tonnes fish oil). This predictability is important and is a result of the focus on and introduction of adaptive stock management practices over the last decades.

Additional raw material ingredients allow businesses to have a platform from which they can make innovation-driven claims. As long as these are considered safe and can legitimately claim environmental standards, additional materials will help support the growth of the aquaculture sector by supplementing marine ingredients so that required volumes are reached to feed a growing population, sustainably.

Petter M Johannessen