NGO blasts shrimp farming

NGO blasts shrimp farming

Agence France-Presse London

The explosive growth of shrimp farming in developing nations, many in Asia, has caused a "shocking environmental crisis" of deforestation and pollution, a campaign group charged on Wednesday.

A report by the London-based Environmental Justice Foundation (EJF) highlighted what it called "a truly shocking catalog of environmental damage" in shrimp-farming nations, also found in Central America and, to a lesser extent, Africa.

The 77-page publication, called "Farming the Sea, Costing the Earth", detailed what the group said was a series of environmental costs such as the destruction of mangrove forests and the depletion of other maritime stocks.

The farming of shrimps, also known as prawns, has increased rapidly in a number of poor countries over recent years, with Thailand, China, Indonesia, Vietnam and Bangladesh the top five producers by weight.

The trade had been hailed as an environmentally friendly way of allowing such countries to produce and export food while allowing natural seafood stocks to recover, but the EJF report said this view was misplaced.

Chief among the problems was the destruction of mangrove forests and other wetland areas -- often illegally -- to build shrimp farms, while the use of often dangerous chemicals had contributed to a build-up of pollution.

In some cases, notably in Thailand, the build-up of pollutants was so bad that farms were simply abandoned after a while, with the land unable to be used for anything else.

Additionally, fish stocks were being seriously hit by the accidental catching of other species as farmers trawled for young shrimp "fry", the group said.

It was up to foreign retailers and governments to pressure producers to use sustainable methods, the EJF said.

"Our report reveals a truly shocking catalog of environmental damage that has occurred as a result of a "get rich quick" attitude by shrimp farmers, egged on by governments and environment agencies," said the group's director, Steve Trent.

"It is time for the seafood industry and governments to take a stand and end these abuses. To fail to do so will spell long-term disaster for some of the world's poorest, marginalized coastal communities and for unique wildlife habitats."

A week ago the United States said it would ban the import of all non-farmed shrimp from Thailand because of the country's failure to take steps to protect endangered sea turtles from shrimp trawling.

However 95 percent of Thailand's shrimps are farmed.

The main international dispute over such shrimps has been a complaint by U.S. producers that some developing nations have been dumping their produce on the international market.

The quasi-judicial U.S. International Trade Commission voted in February for a finding against shrimps from Brazil, China, Ecuador, India, Thailand and Vietnam.