To many, fish is synonymous with salmon. But this wasn’t always the case. When I was growing up, salmon was an expensive treat we’d only get once or twice a year — if we were lucky. Today, however, salmon is rapidly becoming one of the most consumed fish species across Europe, the Americas, and Asia. From New York to Nairobi, salmon is guaranteed in nearly any sushi restaurant.
So, what’s changed — and is it for the better?
Up until the 1990s, most of the fish we consumed came from the wild. Fish was, and half of it still is, one of the last remaining wild food systems in the world — where people are intimately connected to the rhythms of nature, and must read and respond to the signs of stress and change to keep the system sustainable.
Since the 1990s, farmed salmon production has grown rapidly, providing more than 2.4 million tons in 2024. The majority of salmon consumed in the Global North is now farm raised. And most (more than 80%) of the salmon sold on the market today comes from industrial fish farms, dominated by Norway, Chile, Scotland, and Canada.
Despite the celebrated dietary benefits of fish — like omega 3s and micronutrients — farmed salmon brings with it ethical problems that should give us pause. This highly industrialized system tends to advantage consumers in the Global North while shifting the social and economic costs onto fishing communities in the Global South.
Salmon is a carnivorous fish, requiring a steady diet of small pelagic fish like sardines, herrings, and mackerels. In order to farm salmon, this rapidly-growing industrial sector must have constant access to a large supply of wild fish, which is dried and ground into a powder called fishmeal or processed into fish oil that helps farmed salmon grow faster and larger.
Most of this wild fish supply comes from the cold, highly productive waters off South America. But because these small schooling species are also sensitive to fluctuations in the environment, the supply changes depending on the conditions they’re experiencing. This has led the industry to source from elsewhere.
In recent years, the salmon farming industry has turned to West Africa, where similar cold upwellings support highly productive fisheries. In West African communities, these highly nutritious species are — and have for centuries been — a central part of people’s cultures, diets, and economies. Small pelagic fish support thriving coastal fishing communities, and can be dried and delivered to households across the entire region.
Now fishmeal and fish oil factories have begun springing up along the West African coastline, dramatically changing both the landscape and how people source their food. A decade ago, there were around 10 factories; by 2020 there were over 40. During this timeframe, small pelagic fish consumption in the region has decreased by half and the price of fish has increased by 500%. Instead of going into the nets of local fishers and onto the dinner plates of local communities, West Africa’s abundance of small pelagic fish are heading to factories to be processed and used by the industrial salmon farming industry.
These changes are having an enormous impact on nutrition in West Africa’s coastal communities. Micronutrient-rich fish are essential to healthy development, particularly for young children and mothers who are pregnant or breastfeeding. Across Africa, just six grams of small, dried fish — a cheap and commonly available source of food — is enough to meet a third of a child’s daily requirements across several of the most commonly lacking micronutrients.
Historically, these local fish are highly affordable, providing a critical source of nutrition, particularly to low-income households and children. In 2021, diets low in omega 3s from seafood were found to contribute to nearly 750,000 deaths, and 18 million years of healthy life lost to cardiovascular disease worldwide. Unfortunately, the salmon industry has yet to show much interest in the diets of low-income households and children across Africa.
Globally, the great gains that have been made in how we produce our food has given us immense flexibility to choose how we meet our dietary needs, a luxury that is not afforded to everyone. This has brought with it a growing awareness of the huge environmental and social impacts of many of these processes.
Today our food system accounts for 30% of global greenhouse gas emissions and is pushing Earth beyond safe limits for climate stability, biodiversity, land, and water. Compared to other protein options, wild-caught fish has a far lower environmental footprint, contributing a fraction of greenhouse gas emissions, requiring less water and arable land, and resulting in less phosphorous or nitrogen pollution than land-based food sources. When caught wild, fish supports 492 million small-scale fishing livelihoods around the world.
Farmed salmon, on the other hand, is rife with problems. In my view, farmed salmon is not truly a “healthy choice” if its current supply chain is causing harm to coastal communities who depend on local fish, as well as marine ecosystems. And right now, healthy diets are unaffordable to more than half of the world’s population, food system workers are often exposed to poor labor conditions, and rates of malnutrition are on the rise.
Until the industry starts listening, I won’t be buying farmed salmon and I suggest others think twice too.
Dr. Christina Chemtai Hicks
Marine Scientist and Oceana Board Member
Dr. Christina Chemtai Hicks is a Professor at Lancaster University, UK, and an interdisciplinary social scientist and marine conservationist. Dr. Hicks’ work focuses on fisheries governance and conservation, food justice and nutrition, and the politics of finance and investment in fisheries and food systems. She is a Pew Fellow in Marine Conservation, an ISI Highly Cited Researcher, and has won several awards for her work, including the Phillip Leverhulme Prize in Geography and the Royal Geographical Society’s Gill Memorial Award.
