There's an interesting article in the April 2006 issue of PopSci. Honestly I read PopSci because somehow I get it for free. Either that or I was drunk when I ordered it and I don't remember. Either way, I didn't consciously pay for it, so go figure. The article was about aquaculture and in particular, the fish farms that are popping up in Hawaii. I had enough coffee that I was even motivated enough to write a response. Which I sent to the author and editor :) So even though it doesn't much matter, here it is, sans the two footnote references. One to an Al Franken piece about a pig-shit geyser and another to a picture of a nabeta. Ah, what the hell, I'll even copy those in at the end.
I just finished reading Osha Gray Davidson's article The Farmer Goes to Sea and am disturbed by the enthusiastic support for the ways in which these farms operate.
I grew up along the Kona coast. More importantly, I grew up fishing along the Kona coast. In the past decades the developments on land has significantly impacted the ocean that surrounds these islands. Adding direct intervention in the form of aquaculture only accelerates the problems associated with rapid development. The operation of Kona Blue's farms have changed migration patterns of local fish, your own accounts of the sharks around the cages attest to that; and the full consequences of aqua-farming are poorly understood.
Reflect on what was reported in the article, that massive amount of fish requires concentrations of food and produces concentrations of waste far beyond what occur naturally. Consider what happens when you have commercial pig farming on land. How much waste that produces and how, when mishandled
[1], that waste can cause significant damage to the land. Now what makes you think aqua-farming will be any different for the ocean?
The development of farmed moi off of O'ahu follows much the same suit. The limited capacity of the farms now shows that they are more "proof of concept" than long term solution. To scale to the levels necessary for even the state of Hawaii to sustain its own consumption would take much more than what is currently available or, in the long term, sustainable. I can go into a grocery store on O'ahu and buy a can of wahoo (what Hawaiians call ono) that's just like your normal can of tuna except that it tastes better and, the fish is commercially caught and packaged in Samoa. I can go into a restaurant in Honolulu and order some delicious mahimahi. That fish will almost always be imported from the south pacific or Mexico. If I walk into the grocery store and buy a pound of tako (octopus) or white crab, it typically will come from India or China.
All of this tells us two things. First that the demand for seafood does exist and the demand will be met. Do I see the need for more locally produced food? You bet? Is it going to come from these farms? Probably not. It would have been interesting for you to report on where the demand is coming from though. The current proposal to raise ahi (yellowfin tuna) off the Kona coast isn't to fill local markets. That fish is earmarked for Japan where people will pay top dollar for the best sushi. A significant portion of the hamachi (yellowtail) shown in your article, will follow the same fate. It is one thing to exploit the natural waters of Hawaii to feed the people of Hawaii, it is another thing entirely to promote a destructive process so that a few farmers can charge top dollar to foreign consumers.
I will remark, more as a personal note than anything else, that I have bought exactly one (1) of the farmed moi. I regularly eat fish. As it happens I ate a nabeta (peacock wrasse)
[2] for dinner tonight. By comparison the farmed moi tasted like a slice of stale wonder bread. I am thankful to have access to this beautiful ocean and the gifts it provides. Farmed fish are like the Christmas sweaters from your mother in law that hides in the back of a closet.
I understand the economic motivation behind it. People will demand fish, and as the natural stocks are depleted some means of meeting this demand will be necessary, but to look at aquaculture as though it is either sustainable or inconsequential to the environment is simply incorrect.
The World Bank regularly studies the indirect economic costs associated with development and they regularly find that environmentally exploitive development have far more significant long term costs. Want to provide water to New York for decades to come? Preserving the natural water in the Catskills is significantly cheaper than building a processing plant capable of handling that output. Our natural coral reefs and the marine life they support are the same. Long-line commercial fishing, destruction of coastal reefs and over-fishing allowed by lax monitoring and laughable regulation of commercial industries do not consider the long term costs of their actions, but as people dependent on the ocean, we should.
And just so you don't think I'm being too harsh here, I understand the need to grow food. And what's more, I appreciate a good sushi. It's just that this isn't growing food, it's exploiting natural coastline for little more than greed and a piece of sushi. At that point, why not start marketing Soylent Green.
[1] http://skeptically.org/gov/id11.html[2] http://filaman.ifm-geomar.de/Summary/SpeciesSummary.php?id=5613
