Likewise, traditional commercial inshore fishermen also see conflict and have complained regularly that both finfish and shellfish aquaculture facilities are often terribly destructive of the seabed in and around productive, or formerly productive, fishing grounds. Enter a group of 10 scientists in the United States, who decided to take a look at the whole burgeoning aquaculture industry world-wide in an effort to determine its success in buttressing global seafood supplies against the ongoing decline in wild fish stocks due to habitat destruction and overfishing. The study was funded by a private foundation with support from Stanford University-and its findings constitute a dire warning that without a significant change in direction, policy and technique, some forms of aquaculture, and particularly salmon farming, present a threat to wild stocks and to coastal ecosystems without necessarily enhancing global food supplies. The complete findings were reported in the prestigious Nature Magazine earlier this year. The most common criticism was that the data included in the study were out of date, but she said the 1997 information was the most recent available when the research was conducted.
Governments seem willing to overlook environmental damage.
Both shrimp and salmon farming, Dr. Goldburg said, tend to extract a great deal from the natural environment. Shrimp farming could be greatly improved, but salmon farming will be the toughest to render sustainable. There is also the question of what impact such practices might have on food supplies for wild species dependent upon them for natural predation. The situation represents a political and scientific challenge, Dr. Goldburg said, that is going to require co-operation among international food and agricultural agencies, the World Bank, and so on. The use of wild fish to feed farmed fish places direct pressure on fisheries resources.