Background on Aquaculture  

More than one billion people throughout the world rely on fish as a major source of protein. A significant number of this fish is raised on aquaculture farms.

The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) noted that aquaculture’s contribution to global fisheries  (excluding aquatic plants) increased to 27 percent in 2000 from 3.9 percent in 1970.  In 2001, aquaculture accounted for nearly 38 million tonnes (a value of US$ 55.7 billion) of the world’s 130 million tonnes of fish produced. Aquaculture’s contribution was up from 35.5 million tonnes in the previous year.  On the other hand, environmental factors caused the decline of fish caught in the wild to 92.4 million tonnes in 2001, from 95.4 million tonnes a year ago.

The FAO’s projections of world fishery production are bleak, showing that capture of fish by traditional fisheries will stagnate in the next 30 years. “Aquaculture is really the only way to meet the gap between supply and the growing world demand for fish to eat,”  said Jiansan Jia, chief of FAO’s Inland Waters and Aquaculture Service at the FAO’s meeting on Aquaculture in Norway in 2003.

Projection of World Fishery Production in 2010

Projections of world fishery production in 2010 (see table below) range between 107 and 144 million tonnes, of which about 30 million tonnes will probably be reduced to fish meal and oil for non-food use. Estimated quantities which will be available for human consumption range between 74 million tonnes and 114 million tonnes. Most of the increase in fish production is expected to come from aquaculture which is growing rapidly. The contribution from capture fisheries will depend on some further development and also on the effectiveness of fisheries management. Improved management of currently overfished stocks could provide  an increase of between 5 and 10 million tonnes, whereas continued overfishing will lead to declining production, as reflected in the pessimistic scenario in the table.

Links:

Overview of world fisheries in 2001 -- ftp://ftp.fao.org/fi/document/trends/overview/2001/commodit/2001fisheryoverview.pdf 

 

FAO’s State of World Fisheries and Aquaculture -- http://www.fao.org/docrep/005/y7300e/y7300e00.htm

 

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