A study by researchers from New York University and Yale University has found that we have little to no understanding whatsoever of the welfare needs of most species of farmed fish. While the way we treat animals in any kind of farm is redundant when they should not be there in the first place, this news perfectly demonstrates our disconnect with sentient beings who feel pain and have a capacity to experience suffering.

Investigations by newspapers and animal protection organisations over the last few years have revealed terrible conditions at fish farms around the world. Viva’s recent expose of Scottish salmon farms that supply most of the UK’s major supermarkets found putrid conditions, infestations of parasitic sea lice and barbaric lice management systems; while in February Animal Equality obtained secretly filmed footage that showed workers at a farm supplying Waitrose tearing gills with their fingers while the fish were still alive and bludgeoning them to death. In 2019, the number of farmed fish in Scotland dying premature deaths hit an all-time high, with 10 million fish succumbing to “viral, bacterial and fungal infections, along with algal blooms, and “treatment losses” from mistakes with chemicals or de-licing machines.”

These are just a few examples and while they are all truly horrific, the disregard with which we treat fish is sadly not surprising when we understand so little about them. According to a new study published last week in the journal Science Advances, which looked at the more than 400 species of fish farmed around the world, “specialized welfare information was available for 84 species, only 30 per cent of individuals; the remaining 70 per cent either had no welfare publications or were of an unknown species.”

The study went on to highlight the growing acceptance by the scientific community that fish have a level of sentience, memory and an experience of pain and suffering that means we must give them moral consideration and the same protections afforded to terrestrial farmed animals, while cephalopods such as octopuses have such high intelligence that they should not be farmed at all:

Recent work with aquatic invertebrates is also uncovering unexpected abilities. In addition to the remarkable and diverse mental capabilities of cephalopods, studies have found complex maze learning in shore crabs, sophisticated navigation in spiny lobsters, and emotional behavior in crayfish.

While there is no singular, agreed upon cutoff for when welfare protections are ethically necessary, many of the species involved in aquaculture—including finfish and tetrapods, decapod crustaceans, and cephalopods—are now recognized as having the behavioral, cognitive, and affective abilities that meet widely accepted criteria for moral consideration and welfare protection.

The study brings together earlier research into fish pain, cognition and sentience, and while it does go on to recommend that we should farm bivalves - such as clams and mussels - instead due to their less complex welfare needs, it does reveal the staggering lack of understanding of a vast number of species that we farm with no regard for their suffering whatsoever.

Furthermore, the study revises many of the estimates that we as animal rights campaigners use all the time. We often quote the number of animals killed each year to be around 55 billion, however, the study uses estimates for terrestrial species (cows, sheep etc.) closer to 70 billion while FAO data showed farmed aquatic animal tonnage as equivalent to 250 to 408 billion individuals, of which 59 to 129 billion are vertebrate fish (such as carp and salmon).

The issue of whether or not fish feel pain is a tricky one from an abolitionist animal rights perspective. Last year, in Should we really care if fish feel pain? we argued that while it is important to understand the science, ethically, cognition and an experience of suffering is less relevant when we question these benchmarks for moral consideration.

However, in closing we quote Lynne Sneddon, a biologist at the University of Gothenburg and an expert on fish pain, speaking to the Guardian: “These animals are sentient beings, they are capable of experiencing pain, fear, stress, and yet we farm them in conditions that would not be acceptable for mammals or birds.”

If we care about cows, sheep, pigs and chickens enough to be horrified at investigation footage, we must be equally disgusted at the treatment endured by fish and other aquatic species. Much of that treatment is justified by the belief that fish do not feel anything, but as we know from this study and all the work it references, this simply is not true. It is time to face up to our guilt and the uncomfortable, horrifying truth.

For more about the ethical, environmental and health issues regarding our consumption of fish and other aquatic species, please follow the links to watch our ‘School of Thought’ series of videos.

Andrew Gough is Media and Investigations Manager at Surge.

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