Growing industry recognition of fish welfare

Welfare important to consumers and farmers

Often overlooked by consumers in comparison to research investigating perceptions of terrestrial animals, 61% of those surveyed by Globescan rated welfare as an ‘important factor when choosing seafood products’, sitting alongside other ‘responsible’ practices. More conventional drivers, such as food safety, taste, health and price, still dominated consumer opinion, but welfare’s growing recognition as ‘important’ is encouraging.

And consumers are not alone in prioritising welfare. New data from Rabobank and the Global Seafood Alliance presented at the summit revealed welfare as a leading response from both finfish and shrimp producers when asked about sustainability. Around 80% indicated they are implementing practices to improve welfare.

Having not been included in previous Rabobank figures, this high ranking might be news to some, but working extensively in this area, FAI is delighted to see impetus building. 

Certification strengthening welfare requirements

This recognition of welfare is being seen in certification programmes too, cementing its place in the industry’s future direction.

In April, the Humane Farm Animals Care Certified Humane® Welfare Standards for Farmed Tilapia were launched. The prerogative of Certified Humane® is to have standards based on scientific research, international best practice and expert input.

The standards include detailed guidelines for all stages of tilapia production covering topics such as water quality, feeding and nutrition, humane handling and transport, and fish health and welfare. They expect this certification to add value for tilapia producers.

The Aquaculture Stewardship Council (ASC) has released a significant update to its certification programme by launching a new unified Farm Standard, coming into force in May 2027 after a two-year transition period. This ASC update consolidates multiple species-specific standards into a single, integrated framework for aquaculture operations.

In addition to enhanced social and environmental requirements, the update has particularly strong animal welfare criteria. The new standard takes a holistic approach to welfare. Building on the basics of health and welfare plans with veterinary oversight, it has introduced requirements for monitoring operational welfare indicators (OWIs) to support producers in understanding and improving fish welfare.

The standard also requires producers to move over a three-year period to ablation-free shrimp brood stock and to implement humane slaughter, with effective stunning across all species.

The Best Aquaculture Practices (BAP) certification programme has also updated its salmon standard, with improvements across its welfare criteria. These include a greater emphasis on the use of OWIs, tighter controls on humane slaughter and higher requirements on cleaner fish welfare, all absent in the previous standard.

Empowering farmers with the tools to change

The emphasis on welfare indicators in these standards reviews has not happened by chance, they are central to improving welfare.

FAI’s welfare assessment protocol is based on an indicator framework for nutrition, health, animal behaviour and physical environment. From this we’ve developed easy-to-use assessment tools, such as the tilapia welfare app, to help farmers make the changes on farm they are seeking. Farmers are those best positioned to improve fish welfare, and these tools empower them to do so.

Alongside these tools, we offer an extensive range of online courses through FAI Academy, enrolments for which also reflect the growing appetite for knowledge and skills on fish welfare.

In the last two years, enrolments on FAI courses across all aquatic species have increased 50% year on year, now standing at more than 6,700.

Training farmers and other aligned professionals not only improves the welfare of their animals but with it comes better efficiency, productivity and profitability. Improved fish welfare not only leads to healthier fish but to a better product for consumers and greater financial returns for farmers.

Supporting the development of industry-relevant standards and enabling fish farmers to implement the highest levels of welfare, we are advancing a more sustainable and responsible global aquaculture sector.