Index Farmed vs. Wild: The Basics Animal Welfare and Fish Husbandry Possible Contaminants in Farmed Salmon Effects of Farmed Salmon on the Commercial Fishing Industry Argued Benefits of Farmed Salmon 'raised in the wild My favorite meal is the one my mother has prepared for me and my family for as long as I can remember; it consists of grilled teriyaki salmon, steamed broccoli, white rice and blackberry tart with vanilla ice cream. The most significant part of this meal is the salmon, because my father was a commercial fisherman in Alaska when I was growing up. My family spent almost every summer in Kodiak, Alaska, in front of Dad's fence, until I was about ten years old. Since my father fished salmon for a living, we ate salmon almost every night and it is still one of my favorite foods and something my mother regularly makes for dinner. While this dinner may not be anything exceptional or out of the ordinary, it is a meal that reminds me of home and my childhood and one that I can't wait to eat with my family. I also have a special connection to this meal because it reminds me of the summers I spent in Alaska and the process my father went through to catch and prepare the fish we ate. These memories make salmon especially important and sentimental to me and my family. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay Since this meal is one of my favorites and is something I eat often, I wanted to learn more about its ingredients, including the nutritional, economic, and environmental aspects, so that I could better understand how this meal affects not only me, but on the people around me and on the planet itself. To figure out whether I would consider this meal a “good” choice to eat, I looked at the central and most significant dish for my family, salmon. I asked about the ethical and environmental obligations of salmon, so I could make an informed decision about the impact of this meal. Farmed vs. Wild: The Basics The first topic I wanted to explore was the differences between farmed and wild salmon and the environmental impacts of both. My parents have always been extremely supportive of wild salmon, because they believe it tastes better and is better for the environment, as well as a more humane way of catching fish. However, more than 90% of fresh salmon consumed in this country is farmed, with sales growing 10% to 20% a year, according to Alex Trent, executive director of the industry group Salmon of the Americas. (Kolata) This statistic made me think that if so many people in our country eat farmed salmon, there must be reasons why we should choose to expand salmon farming, instead of continuing to fish salmon from natural waters, and I wanted to know more about the pros and cons of both fishing methods. One of the main reasons people choose farmed salmon over wild salmon is the extremely large and growing population on Earth. With over 7 billion people on this planet, many of them without access to wild salmon, farmed salmon makes perfect sense to adapt to the needs of our society. However, considering the population of our planet, I still wonder whether it is justifiable to replace wild salmon with farmed salmon worldwide. From personal experiences, I have developed a preference and a sort of obligation towards wild salmon, so it is difficult for me to imagine purchasing and consuming it instead of farmed. However, despite mypreferred method of salmon fishing, I know there are valid reasons to choose farmed salmon instead and I wanted to examine those reasons in more depth and also investigate the disadvantages of both methods. Before I could make an informed, moral decision about whether or not I feel comfortable consuming wild or farmed salmon, I had to investigate the distinct pros and cons of both types of fish. Animal Welfare and FishFarming During my research on farmed salmon, one of the key topics I kept coming across was animal welfare and whether raising animals just for our needs was morally legitimate or not. An article on sustainable aquaculture, published in the Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics, informed its readers about the moral obligations of “zootechnics”, meaning the cultivation and production of animals, or in this article, salmon (Olsen et. al, 1-4). The authors of this paper say they support the proposition that the welfare of fish should be given serious moral consideration and, although researchers disagree on how fish react to capture, that they should be given the benefit of the doubt and treated humanely (12). “Even from a more selfish point of view, we could support fair treatment of animals. If we inflict suffering on animals, we violate human dignity and could contribute to the development of a crueler society” (Olsen, et. al). The authors make this point when discussing animal welfare to convey that we should all care about animal suffering. animals, regardless of whether it affects us directly or not. Although this article often talks about the ethical issues involved in salmon farming, the authors are not actually against this practice, but rather would see it done in a more humane and sustainable way. According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, sustainability is defined as: . . the management and conservation of natural resources and the orientation of technological and institutional change in such a way as to ensure the achievement and continuous satisfaction of the human needs of present and future generations. Such sustainable development in agriculture, forestry and fisheries preserves land, water, plant and animal genetic resources, is not environmentally degrading, is technically appropriate, economically sustainable and socially acceptable (13) . This definition is important, because sustainability is a difficult topic to define and reach consensus on, especially when it refers to animal welfare, since everyone has different opinions on the issue. Olsen and the other authors of this article agree with the UN definition, adding animal needs to human needs (13). The journal article goes on to discuss ways in which we can ensure sustainability in fish farming, focusing on animal production systems, husbandry approaches, sources of feed ingredients and genetic engineering strategies, and possible ways in which fish farming could be changed in the future. . As for my favorite dish and what information I would like to find out about it, this article has given me a better understanding of salmon farming, including how it is done, the moral, ethical and environmental impacts, and how relates to animal welfare. After researching farmed salmon, I still believe that wild salmon is a better choice. However, I am now more knowledgeable about the reasons for raising salmon, including convenience, feeding ourgrowing population and cost-effectiveness, and I think if some changes were made to the process, salmon farming could be a suitable solution for feeding salmon. growing number of people in our country and on our planet. Possible Contaminants Found in Farmed Salmon After further investigation of wild versus farmed salmon, I identified another concern that needed to be addressed: the presence of potentially harmful contaminants often found in farmed salmon. The New York Times Journal of Science published in 2004 the largest study ever conducted that examined the amount of contaminants present in both wild and farmed salmon, finding a sevenfold difference in levels of polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs. The concentration of PCBs in farmed salmon was more than 55 times higher than the tolerance level set by the Food and Drug Administration. PCBs are a family of chemical compounds that were once used as...refrigerants and lubricants and in the production of plastics and paints, but were banned in the 1970s by the Environmental Protection Agency, due to studies that found them to be possible carcinogens . The author of this journal article states that the PCBs present in farmed fish were acquired through their food, specifically the fish oil present in it. Another smaller study was conducted on this topic by the Environmental Working Group who tested ten farmed salmon purchased at the supermarket for the presence of PCBs. The group concluded that PCB levels were so high that people should eat farmed salmon no more than once a month (Kolata). However, in contrast to these studies, Dr. Michael Gallo, of the Cancer Institute at Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, said that PCBs are mixtures, some could cause cancer in laboratory rodents, and that some of the carcinogenic PCBs are blocked by others . which do not cause cancer. Dr. Gallo has received no money from either the seafood or chemical industries and claims that so far there is no concrete evidence that PCBs are carcinogenic (Kolata). A consensus on the carcinogenic properties of PCBs has not yet been reached, and there are still many scientists and researchers with conflicting opinions about it, so it is difficult for me to decide whether or not I want to continue eating farmed salmon. After reading these studies and research, I still maintain my initial opinion that I prefer to consume wild salmon. While my opinion is based primarily on the moral and environmental implications of salmon, this information about PCBs supports my initial thoughts. PCBs may not be proven to be carcinogenic, but I would still avoid eating more than the FDA recommends. After reading these various studies and opinions, I agree with one environmental advocacy group's statement that farmed salmon should not be consumed more than once a month. The Effects of Farmed Salmon on the Commercial Fishing Industry Another possible concern about farmed salmon is that salmon farming is collapsing the commercial fishing industry in the Pacific Northwest. While this may not affect all consumers, the decline of commercial fishing directly affects many of my friends and family. In a journal article, written by Ashley Dean at Stanford University, Rosamond L. Naylor, a Julie Wrigley Senior Fellow at Stanford's Center for Environmental Science and Policy, noted that the weakening of the salmon industry wild is particularly evident in Alaska, where 10%of the workforce is employed in this sector (Dean). Naylor delves into this issue and states that; “The capture of wild salmon has historically played an important economic role by providing employment and income to large numbers of Native American and non-Native communities along the coast” (Naylor qtd in Dean). Dean also explains that competition from salmon farms in Chile, Norway, the United Kingdom and other countries has reduced Alaska's share of the global fishing market from 40-50% to just 20% since 2000 and that, Because of this, the state has had to provide commercial fishermen with a variety of financial aid programs. (Dean) The farmed salmon industry is causing serious harm to the commercial fishing industry and is responsible for job losses or serious setbacks for many who do not fish for wild salmon. In addition to the devastating economic impact that the farmed fishing industry has on commercial fisheries, there are also significant ecological threats from farmed salmon that wild salmon also pose. Dean describes farmed salmon as being raised in pens built along the shore, making them particularly susceptible to diseases and parasites, such as sea lice, which can be harmful to wild salmon (Dean). An article titled “Salmon Aquaculture in the Pacific Northwest: A Global Industry,” published in Environment Magazine, states that an even greater economic risk to wild salmon involves the escape of farmed salmon from net pen facilities, and adds also that in the last ten years over a million fish have escaped from farms in Washington and British Columbia (Naylor et al qtd in Dean). The authors go on to state that escaped fish are able to live and reproduce in the wild and compete for food and habitat with wild salmon populations (Dean). To learn more about the threats posed by escaped farmed salmon, I read the full version of this article in Environment magazine and learned that salmon farms periodically lose thousands to tens of thousands of fish at a time due to storms, of marine mammal predation and human errors. . However, it is suspected that even more salmon escape due to chronic low-level losses than due to large-scale events (Naylor et al). The escape of farmed salmon into wild salmon habitats can cause a variety of detrimental effects on wild salmon habitat and ultimately the wild salmon industry. Farmed salmon can spread deadly diseases and parasites to wild fish populations, deprive them of their food supplies, and take over their habitat, causing alarming declines in wild fish population sizes. This unexpected and significant decline in populations makes wild salmon fishing unpredictable and often not a reliable and sufficient source of income, and is rapidly putting a strain on the commercial fishing industry. While these effects of farmed salmon on the wild salmon industry are not something that all salmon consumers will consider, it is something that definitely concerns me, since the decline of wild salmon is a threat to many people who My family and I care. Having lived in Alaska and grown up in a family that made a living from commercial fishing, I think it's critical that I do my part in supporting this industry. The next time I have to choose between farmed or wild salmon, the effects my choices have on the commercial fishing industry will definitely play a role in my decision. The benefits discussed.