World’s first octopus farm can be a threat to other aquatic creatures, say US researchers

Spanish seafood company, Nueva Pescanova, plans to set up the world’s first commercial octopus farm. But scientists have said that this form of aquaculture is extremely cruel and could lead to an environmental disaster, BBC reported.

Image credits: Pixabay 

According to the documents from the Nueva Pescanova, the farm in Canary Island, Spain, would be used for raising millions of octopuses annually for food. The proposal has been sent to the General Directorate of Fishing of the Canary Island.

Nueva Pescanova’s scientific breakthrough

The demand for octopus meat is rapidly increasing. It is consumed in every part of the world, including Latin America, Asia and the Mediterranean region. To meet this demand, the production of octopus meat is high.

However, breeding octopuses in captivity is difficult. They are carnivores and if raised in captivity, they’ll eat other animals to survive. But in 2019, Nueva Pescanova made a scientific breakthrough. The company discovered that the octopus born in aquaculture could reach adulthood and reproduce in an environment outside its natural habitat. This put an end to the octopus reproduction cycle in aquaculture.

The company’s research team worked on 50 octopuses of the common species called Octopus vulgaris that were born in aquaculture in 2018. This is the most consumed species in Spain and is produced in the Mediterranean sea, Mauritania region and Atlantic ocean. The team found that half of the octopuses were female and reached adulthood. One of these female octopuses laid eggs and took care of them for approximately one month until these eggs hatched and offspring were born.

“The octopus requires very specific marine conditions for its development, such as the availability of food and optimal oceanographic factors related to temperature, salinity, ocean currents and the welfare of the animal”, said Ricardo Tur, Principal Investigator of Cephalopods (marine animals) at Pescanova.

Image credits: Pixabay

The survival rate of wild octopuses is 0.0001 percent, while Pescanova’s results showed that the survival rate could rise to 50 percent in aquaculture. Nueva Pescanova aimed to discover new ways for octopus marketing to meet the high international demand for octopus meat, which resulted in the shortage of wild octopuses and a problem of sustainability of the marine habitat.

“We will continue to investigate how to continue improving the well-being of octopuses, studying and replicating their natural habitat, with the expectation of being able to start marketing aquaculture octopus from the year 2023,” stated Ignacio González, CEO of Nueva Pescanova. 

Plans for octopus farming

Nueva Pescanova has acquired aquaculture that will help it to sustain wild stocks. It will keep the solitary octopuses in dark and other octopuses under constant light. The species Octopus vulgaris would be kept in 1,000 communal tanks in a two-storey building in the Las Palmas port, Gran Canaria, Spain. Then, they would be killed by putting them in water containers kept at -3 degrees Celsius. 

Currently, no welfare rules have been proposed as octopuses were commercially farmed before. But studies have shown that slaughtering fish using the ice slurry method results in slow and stressful death. “To kill them with ice would be a slow death … it would be very cruel and should not be allowed,” said Prof. Peter Tse, a cognitive neuroscientist at Dartmouth University, US. He also stated that the octopuses could be killed more humanely by hitting on their head.

Nueva Pescanova wants to yield 3,000 tonnes of octopuses annually to sell them in the premium international markets, including Japan, South Korea and the US. According to Compassion in World Farming (CiWF), it would be equal to about one million animals with 10 to 15 octopuses per cubic metre of the tank. The company has also estimated that the mortality rate will be 10 to 15 percent.