246 Fish as feed inputs for aquaculture – Practices, sustainability and implications
- Lack of recognized criteria for suitability: At present, there are no feed manufacturing
industry standard definitions or criteria for the sustainability of feed fisheries. It
currently uses the FIN Sustainability Dossier for guidance, but this is essentially
limited to examining stock assessment reports and regulatory frameworks. This
dossier does not include some of the elements included in the assessment criteria
used in this study, such as non-target species impacts, regulatory compliance
levels, availability of key information and knowledge relevant to sustainability,
as well as economic and social factors. The MSC-derived framework used by this
study is considered an improvement on the FIN Dossier, and one that should be
adopted more widely. The setting of sustainability criteria will ultimately enable
both fish producer and consumer to purchase selectively, creating a market for a
sustainable product. - Traceability: Although the traceability of feed ingredient sources is improving
rapidly, it may be difficult to ensure the origin of all fishmeal. For instance,
fishmeal is often blended to give constant characteristics of density, flow,
digestibility and protein content, and thus species identity tends to be uncertain.
Much of the South American fishmeal is blended at the time of loading of tankers
(both ship and road) and hence cannot be traced beyond that point. Traceability
is high on the feed industry’s agenda, and some manufacturers are looking to
traceability schemes such as the Universal Feed Assurance Scheme (UFAS) and
the Feed Materials Assurance Scheme (FEMAS) to reduce the purchase of feed
products where there is not a full traceability chain. - Fishmeal nutritional performance: Restrictions on certain fishmeal stocks may
have implications for fishmeal nutritional performance. For instance, smaller fish
(i.e. salmon <1 kg) need high levels of amino acid histidine that is found in much
higher levels in South American fishmeal – exclusion from these would necessitate
much higher fishmeal inclusion levels for European meals and thus higher levels
of consumption. There is the potential for substitution with porcine blood meal,
but this is likely to meet retail and consumer resistance. Conversely, for larger fish,
the use of meals from the northern hemisphere produced at low temperature (LT)
is favoured because they are higher in protein and of the highest digestibility. For
instance, blue whiting meal is a highly digestible meal and while some users dislike
its higher ash level, most processors find it worthwhile using and may be reluctant
to reduce its use. - Supply assurance: Should the industry become selective for more sustainable
fishmeal stocks, the demand for those stocks will increase. This has a number of
implications:
o Fishmeal supply may be restricted for reasons outside the control of fishmeal
manufacturers and their clients, e.g. the wide inter-annual variability of
South American production through the El Niño events.
o Connected with the point above, prices may become more variable, with a
general shift upwards as the supply base is effectively reduced.
o Increased pressure will be put upon sustainable fishmeal stocks. However,
this should not be an issue if they are well regulated and controlled (as they
should be if deemed as sustainable).
o Risk reduction – formulators such as a mix of fishmeals from different sources
to reduce the risk of unforeseen quality or contamination problems.
These concerns are only really valid over the short term. Longer-term supply
assurance depends on the sustainable management of feed fisheries, and the
industry may have to review its approach to fishery exploitation if it is to continue
to be viable in the future.