Friend of the Sea (FoS) and Fair-Fish International Organizations carried out a new project named CAREFISH in order to increase awareness of animal welfare principles for the Friend of the Sea certificated aquaculture companies.
Within the scope of this project, the researchers of FishEthoBase organization are going to perform directly visits to companies and analyse the current situations by making observations. The datas which are obtained from these visits and farm-based improvement suggestions, are going to be evaluated gradually according to the Friend of the Sea standards. Some parameters such as environment and water quality, behavioral and physiological conditions and training the staff about welfare are going to be used for evaluating fish welfare. Besides, the researches which are made by FoS ve Fair Fish, are planning to be presented in academes and industrial conferences. The project will contain the farms in Croatia, Italy, Spain, Greece, Turkey and Australia.
Paolo Bray; who is the founder and director of FoS, identified fish welfare as one of the most important expectations of consumers from aquaculture companies and fish welfare requirements as being assumed in certification criterias.
According to the evaluations of FishEthoBase; fish welfare is going to be possible with potential, survival and individuality. It took place in legal regulations of EU and is even legislated under the name of Animal Welfare Law in the year of 2008 in some countries.
The FoS certificated companies, get involved to the programme by taking their initiatives and volunteering. Accordingly; they pose questions or correct mistakes in their own certification evaluations.
The process stages in the project of Global Gap Aqua Module which we took place with FoS in the past times were similar with this new ‘CAREFISH’ project. As being one of the industry- leading companies; we were praised in the evaluation report prepared after our first visit to FishEthoBase.
I would like to draw attention on the conference named “2nd Summer Shoal on Fish Ethology and Welfare“ for the people who are interested in this matter. The conference is going to be organized in Italy between the dates of 1st and 5th October and include fish behaviours, welfare standards in fish breeding, evaluation of harvesting methods, solution proposals, fish welfare and such attractive issues. Additionally, another organization named SIBIC 2018 was organized by VII Congress Of The Iberian Society in Portuguese. The results and broadcasts of it can be followed via internet.
It is undoubtedly that animal welfare will be an obligation over the short term. Moreover, it is going to include food security and quality, breeding standards and integrated harvesting procedures. Good luck to all of us...
Sources:
http://www.friendofthesea.org/news-doc.asp?CAT=1&ID=1110
http://fishethobase.net/en/summer-shoal-2018/
