American shrimp… a victim of commercial competition
On a cold December morning, the captain of the ship “Miss Mate” was ready to go shrimp fishing. Captain Brian Jordan's crew is in a bad mood, and no wonder, because none of this is worth it? On the small waterfront of Tybee Island, Georgia, the hesitation makes sense: Shrimp prices have fallen this year, and hundreds of boats from Brownsville, Texas, to Harkers Island, North Carolina, remain docked. The problem wasn't the shrimp shortage or the price of diesel fuel.
But rather, refrigerators across the United States are full. The abundance of imported shrimp has brought the price down to about half of what shrimp boats were getting in the 1980s. So the livelihoods of Captain Jordan and other shrimp fishermen are at stake across the country. They cannot compete with foreign producers who raise and harvest shrimp on low-cost “aquaculture” farms.
There, juvenile shrimp essential to the food chain of marine life are raised in artificial saltwater ponds, then harvested in bulk and sold at discounted prices around the world.
Because shrimp is the most valuable marine product traded in the world today — the industry has grown from $10.6 billion in 2005 to more than $60 billion in 2022 — this shift has consequences on many fronts. This practice generates significant income in developing countries such as Thailand, Indonesia, India, Vietnam, Brazil, Ecuador and Bangladesh. But some experts say the trend is hurting more than just sailors like Mr. Jordan, and argue that much of the offshore aquaculture industry is damaging the environment.
The average annual per capita consumption of shrimp in the United States is now four pounds. According to the World Wildlife Fund, it takes three to six months to raise market-sized shrimp, with many farmers growing two or three crops a year. The pollution resulting from these farms, most of which are located in tropical climates, is significant, as organic waste, chemicals and antibiotics are dumped into groundwater and estuaries, causing salt to deposit on agricultural lands. Meanwhile, in reality, aquaculture is likely to survive, and can be done in more responsible ways. The American shrimp industry will likely look very different than it has for generations. The question is how will shrimp fishermen adapt and invent new ways of working to keep up with the times? “You have to be both a farmer and an entrepreneur if you want to succeed,” says Frank Ash, a natural resource economist at the University of Florida in Gainesville.
This is the challenge facing the American shrimp fleet.” “The consumer sees a picture of a shrimp boat and some nets hanging there, and they assume the shrimp are from America,” Jordan says. But for the most part it is not.” Growth in the aquaculture sector has reduced the US shrimp fleet by more than half since the 1990s.
Today, less than 10% of the domestic supply is American shrimp caught in American waters. This trend is not limited to shrimp. Fisheries, from salmon to catfish (a catfish-like fish), have been affected, as aquaculture farmers adjust their operations, products and prices. Concerns about aquaculture vary globally. There is documented use of forced labor and the use of antibiotics and herbicides in farm ponds. Aquaculture operations are also known to clear mangrove swamps – nurseries for many oceanic species – to make way for shrimp culture ponds. “It's very difficult to know where your shrimp comes from,” says Ryan Bigelow of the Seafood Watch Initiative. Professor Ash says that more ethically farmed products tend to sell in Europe and the United States, while products that do not meet these standards are sold in less developed economies, where aquaculture has flourished.
And it's not just American shrimp fishing boats that fall prey. But American attempts at aquaculture also struggle to compete. About 100 miles from the Gulf of Mexico, David Teichert Coddington raises shrimp in two dozen ponds drawn from the Eutaw Reservoir in Polegy, Alabama.
The water is salty enough, when amended with other minerals, to grow shrimp and grow quickly. He can say his shrimp are grown in the United States. Meanwhile, he says the Ecuadorian shrimp are clean, well-packed and delicious. As a result, Coddington may leave his pond empty next year. “There's no one solution,” says Paige Morrison, executive director of the Georgia Commercial Fishermen's Association in Savannah. “It will require legislation, it will require support, awareness and education, and it will require a new marketing system – that is, a completely new business model.” There are potential ways forward. For example, the World Wildlife Fund is working to develop enforceable standards that reduce negative environmental and social impacts and ensure quality and safety, while improving aquaculture practices through technical innovations such as forensic analysis of farmed products.
The group also works to encourage practices that help traditional shrimp fishermen continue to make a living. New red snapper fisheries in the Gulf of Mexico have achieved success with distinct new markets, safer and more professional methods, and good prices, albeit with fewer boats.
Patrick Johnson*
*A Christian Science Monitor correspondent based in Atlanta.
Published by special arrangement with the Christian Science Monitor.
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