Tilapia is an inexpensive, mild-flavored fish. It is the fourth most commonly consumed type of seafood in the United States. However, scientific studies have highlighted concerns about tilapia’s fat content and environmental problems. Several reports also raise questions surrounding tilapia farming practices.
In a world where capture fisheries are dwindling, the need to provide relatively cheap and quality protein is amounting, and the drive to feed the ever-growing human population is the world's target, you cannot ignore the contribution of fish farming. Be it tilapia, catfish or salmon, they are all collectively required. After all, not all people can afford high quality salmons. Thus, tilapia culture is beneficial--of course they have to be farmed with environmental sustainability in mind.
Dear Ismael,
I'm agree with you. EIA would be very important in tilapia culture
I agree with Ismael Kimirei,
Fish farming in general has some impacts on the environment and there are many environmental concerns about fish farming. However, comparing fish production with other food production sectors, the impacts are relatively low. And moreover, it is not the fish that cause environmental problems, but the human related impacts from fish farming management and culture metodologies are issues to be considered.
Tilapia, compared to carnivorous species such as trout or salmon has relatively lower protein requirement and nitrogenous end products excreted to the water environment is also relatively lower than carrnivorous species. Hence it might be advisable to search alternative fish species with low-protein requirements. This could reduce environmental impacts due to lower nitrogenous excretion from fish.
Feeding management is another important issue. Today, the mass production in fish farms uses tonnes of feeds and most of these farms use automatic feding systems. Monitoring of feeding activity is important to reduce uneaten feed that might deteriorate water conditions, hence affecting production success. Training of labor is important in this perspective.
The optimization of dietary protein to energy ratio is another important issue to be considered. For example, feeding tilapia with excessively high levels of dietary protein would be a significant mistake. Therefore, species-spesific diets are important.
The fact that we use "WATER" for food production in aquaculture, the most ignored issue here I think is that the water we use in inland aquaculture is fresh water which is also important as drink-water source.
Considering that drink-water resources are limited on earth, we need to focus on the re-use of freshwater in aquaculture facilities. Probably new legislations on the use of water amount in freshwater production systems might help to control the use of water resources.
Regards
Dear Colleague Dr. Shahram,
Our newly published paper might be interesting / useful for your question regarding environmental or nutritional concerns for consumers.
In the attached paper you may find information for nutritional contribution from fish to human consumers, when eating wild versus cage-farmed or cage-aggregated fish.
For your information.
Best wishes,
Murat
Dear My friend,
Many thanks for your kind message and your scientific article.
Hope to meet you soon.
Best regards,
Shahram
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