Alternative seafood
According to the United Nations’ Committee on World Food Security, food security means that “all people, at all times, have physical, social, and economic access to sufficient, safe, and nutritious food that meets their food preferences and dietary needs for an active and healthy life.” If that is so, then obviously, the opposite pervades in the world.That many of us in this world merely exist. On hand-to-mouth existence.
Undeniably, right where we are today, we can see so much uneven distribution of food. The irony is, while some are in fitness gyms spending thousands and, at the same time, go for nutritionist-planned diets to lose weight others are underweight as their pockets are starving for pennies and their wallets are on a diet.
Yet, the sources of food are clear. Consider the ocean. It is a “huge body of saltwater that covers about 71 percent of Earth’s surface”. Obviously, its influence in our food supply cannot be ignored. In fact, its resources are now viewed as central in our efforts to address the multitude of challenges that humanity is expected to face in the coming decades.
For one, pundits projected that by 2050, “the world’s population shall be at least 9 billion.” With such size, the demands for food, jobs, energy, raw materials and economic growth will be enormous. Certainly, the massiveness of the ocean (both the surface as well as its resources down deep) has the potential to help meet these requirements.
Undeniably, forextractive industries (e.g. oil and gas, sea-bed mining), transport and logistics industries (freight and passenger transport), shipbuilding industries, renewable energy extractive industries (e.g. oil and gas, sea-bed mining), transport and logistics industries (freight and passenger transport), shipbuilding industries, renewable energy, there is certainty. For food, however, the future is bleak.
To recall, the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) reported that “global fish consumption per head has doubled since the 1960s” as the “three billion people now depend on marine sustenance for their primary source of protein.” Yet, according to FAO, “90% of fish stocks are fully exploited, overexploited or depleted.” Thus, as the population continue to grow and consumption, likewise, going in the same direction, aquaculture or fish farming is now taking center stage.
FAO predicted that aquaculture will “produce about 59% of fish for human consumption by 2030”, making it the fastest growing food production sector globally. It is for this reason that there are several startups that have sprouted lately to make aquaculture more efficient and sustainable. Scoot Science (Santa Cruz, California) developed “forecasting tools for fisheries.” ReelData (Canada) “automates fisheries with software that tracks things like feeding times and stress levels of fish.”
However, despite these breakthroughs’ benefits, concerns still abound. In fact, one of these concerns is felt today. The health of the fish is becoming to be a big challenge. For one, researchers estimate that “between 2010 and 2016, Thailand’s shrimp industry suffered US$7.4 billion in economic losses from just one emerging disease, with an additional US$4.2 billion in lost exports.” In Norway, according to Nofima and Kontali, when a farmer slaughters 1 million fish (salmon) early, he is bound to loss US$3.5 million to US$5.3 million.
Several startups though are coming in to their rescue. There is OceaneosViAqua Therapeutics (Israel) that “developed a pill that can boost a shrimp’s immunity to disease.” Then, there is this Norway-based Manolin that “offers an automated disease alert system for salmon farmers.”
Surely, these are positive developments and most likely will make aquaculture sustainable. Some health concerns though are raised. Not the health of the fish this time but on us, fish eating human beings. According to Nature Geoscience, the possible intake of hazardous levels of mercury.
Recognizing these concerns, several startups are developing plant-based seafood alternatives. Finless Foods, for one offers plant-based tuna. New Wave Foods (San Francisco, USA) makes plant-based shrimp. AKUA (New York) “pioneered seaweed jerky.”
An industry that is expected to grow 28% annually over the next decade, this is truly a shot in the arm.
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