Is Seafood a More Climate-Friendly Option Than Eating Meat?

Welcome to Burning Questions, a sequence the place Earther solutions the commonest asks we get on how one can tackle local weather change. Many folks wish to do one thing, something to assist tackle the local weather disaster. We reply your questions on how one can assist change your life—and the methods that may save us. Check out our previous Burning Questions right here.

The results of animal agriculture on the planet are… not nice! Globally, the livestock business is answerable for almost 15% of greenhouse gas pollution. In the U.S., cows alone account for 27% of methane emissions.

Chicken and pork are additionally environmental nightmares. Though every business emits much less greenhouse fuel air pollution than beef, each require the manufacturing of a shitload of soy (greater than a 3rd of the world’s soy is fed to poultry and roughly a fifth goes to pigs), which drives deforestation in locations just like the Amazon.

The local weather and ecological harm from animal agriculture has some people turning to veganism. But what about seafood? If you’re not prepared to surrender meat solely, is it OK (or not less than higher) to eat salmon? What about shrimp? We know hot girls love sardines, however does consuming them make the planet hotter? The solutions are sophisticated.

Climate-Wise, Wild-Caught Is Better… Usually

From a strictly emissions perspective seafood is mostly a better option than different kinds of meat.

“Seafood has a smaller carbon footprint than other animal proteins, on average, because fishing doesn’t require farmland or care of livestock,” Anna Baxter, communications specialist at ocean conservation group Oceana, stated in an e mail, citing a 2012 study.

There are even some floor guidelines you possibly can observe to make sure your fish dinner has the lightest footprint attainable. Wild-caught is normally higher. Smaller species like anchovies, herring, and sardines are usually the best options as a result of they’re decrease on the meals chain they usually’re much less usually overexploited. Mollusks like oysters, mussels, and scallops tend to be relatively climate-friendly options as a result of they’ll filter sustenance from the water as an alternative of requiring feed. There are guides on the market, just like the Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch, that may assist make extra knowledgeable decisions.

But nonetheless, issues can get sophisticated.

“Unlike cattle, fish aren’t ruminants that produce methane when they burp and fart,” stated Jan Dutkiewicz, a postdoctoral fellow at Concordia University and visiting fellow within the Animal Law and Policy Program at Harvard University. “And unlike, say, chicken, they’re not produced in polluting environments like [concentrated animal feeding operations] that are highly emitting. … But there are other issues.”

Farming fish has a better local weather affect than catching wild seafood. In 2017, the fish farming sector generated half a p.c of human-caused greenhouse fuel emissions, placing it roughly on par with the emissions of the Netherlands.

While many sorts of wild-caught seafood are extra climate-conscious decisions, that’s not the case for all of them. Crustaceans like shrimp and lobster are related to a few of the highest carbon emissions as a result of the trawling boats used to catch them and reel them in need to continuously cease and begin to set and accumulate traps, utilizing plenty of gasoline within the course of. A 2018 study within the journal Nature Climate Change discovered that lobster and shrimp fisheries can produce extra emissions than rooster and pork farms. Another report, launched this yr, discovered that backside trawlers launch a gigaton of carbon dioxide yearly, which is as a lot as all the aviation business.

There are additionally a wealth of impacts not tied to local weather change. Bottom trawling can wreck delicate seafloor ecosystems whereas fishing gear is a significant supply of plastic air pollution within the ocean. That poses a significant threat to all kinds of marine species, together with apex predators like sharks. Overfishing can be a significant concern, with the United Nations warning {that a} third of the world’s fisheries are getting used at unsustainable charges. Fish farms are additionally sources of air pollution and illness that may have an effect on wild species.

How Do We Fix Seafood?

Swapping out a hamburger for a salmon burger is one step to cut back your weight loss program’s carbon footprint. But it can’t be the one step.

An April report discovered that U.S. fishery managers are failing of their obligation to forestall overfishing and implement annual catch limits. Pushing lawmakers for extra oversight to make sure legal guidelines are being enforced can be a significant systemic motion. But insurance policies may also be improved, significantly as local weather change places extra stress on fisheries. A invoice introduced this summer would enhance current coverage to guard extra creatures and higher account for local weather change. 

Fishing can be a worldwide commerce. Last yr, the World Trade Organization failed to achieve a deal on how one can reduce subsidies to unsustainable fish farms which have helped destroy the world’s fish shares. Joining teams combating for a robust agreement subsequent yr is one other avenue to begin to additional tip the scales.

Frances Withrow, a marine scientist at Oceana, wrote in an e mail that the group can be campaigning to freeze backside trawling and guarantee fishing gear is extra sustainable to chop down on bycatch. It’s yet one more avenue into making certain others selecting to eat seafood have higher choices.

By and huge, although, the science reveals that the most sustainable protein options aren’t animal-based in any respect; they’re plant-based proteins like beans and lentils. So one other technique to shrink seafood’s environmental affect is to shrink the entire sector by increasing extra sustainable alternate options. Governments spend tens of billions worldwide yearly on the fishing economic system, and people incentives can encourage overfishing and overexploitation.

“There’s a very strong case to be made that if people who farmed fresh, healthy vegetables, beans, and pulses were given that same sort of support instead … to develop better varietals, new varietals or just to produce at higher scale, we could achieve lower costs and incentivize people to eat those,” stated Dutkiewicz.