AQUACULTURE

    Aquaculture; The rearing of aquatic animals or the cultivation of aquatic plants for food.

Pros and Cons for Aquaculture

Economic;Pros- Supplies almost half of the global demand for fish.
                        - Provides social-economic contribution to many coastal and rural communities where the fish farming takes place.
                        - Is a 78 billion dollar industry.
                 Cons- Pathogens can result in major fish disease outbreaks ( especially shrimp ) and consequently significant economic losses in producing countries.
                         - Jobs are really sensitive to the outbreaks and with fewer wild shrimp to harvest.
                        - It takes more fish to feed the farmed fish. It takes 26 pounds of "trash" fish to produce 1 pound blue fin tuna. The feed is made up of squid, blue mackerel and sand eel. 37%  of global seafood is ground up into feed for fish and poultry. This is called the "reverse protein effect" when the resources out weigh the product.


Social;-Pros- Provides a living for thousands of farmers whose crop value has dropped.
                  - Supplies a year round supply of protein.
                 - A living for fishermen who do not make enough from                       fishing.
Cons- People in the US have been encouraged to eat more fish for health but learned that the highly recommended farmed fish was found to be tainted with mercury and PCB's.
         - Pesticides and veterinary drugs have been used to treat pests and diseases that hurt fish.
         - Farmed fish are genetically modified and can cause health problems.




 Environmental Pros- Fish farming reduces fishing pressure on certain species and helps the life cycle of certain fish.
                              - Raises fish that have been depleted in the wide like Cod, Sea bass, and Red snapper.
                              - Lets endangered species in the wild rebound.
Cons- Crowded thousands of fish in their artificial environment, waste products like feces, uneaten food and dead fish are flushed often untreated into the surrounding waters add to the contamination.
          - The chemicals of the untreated waste affect the entire aquatic ecosystem. In many area, especially China, waters are already heavily polluted from sewage, industry and agricultural run off.
       - Farm fish sometimes escape into the wide and breed with the wide fish to produce unnatural hybrid species.
      
My Opinion on Fish Farming
   People believe that fish farming is a solution to catching wild fish but I believe it is creating more problems then before. It is true that wild fish could reproduce better but when the fishermen take the smaller "trash" fish and grind it up into feed they are taking away feed of the wild fish so they do not have enough food. Plus, people say that by fish farming we are feeding more people but it actually takes way more fish to feed the fish that are grown. This is the "reverse protein effect" because it takes a lot more resources to make the product so we are not feeding more people. People also believe that farmed fish are just as good for you as wild fish but farmed fish are genetically modified and are very unnatural and are dangerous to peoples health. Farming fish causes a lot of pollution from the chemicals from the waste, uneaten food and dead fish add to the pollution that harm the wild fish and wild ecosystems by poisoning them. In order to help the fish we should really cut back on how much we eat.