By Julia Robins, Staff Writer
Americans are hungry for seafood, but most of that seafood is coming from overseas. The US seafood trade deficit has grown to more than $11.2 billion annually, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. One way to reduce the gap could be through US aquaculture.
“I’ve been in aquaculture in the US for over 25 years, and almost every year the trade deficit has gotten bigger,” says Michael Schwarz, Virginia Tech Aquaculture Specialist affiliated with Virginia Sea Grant. “We have all the capacity to fix it here, and a big part this will be through public education.”
Some of that public education has already begun. On July 23, regulators, government representatives, and aquaculture producers got together at the Hampton Roads Agricultural Research and Extension Center (AREC) for a series of talks on the best management practices (BMPs) for aquaculture.
Topics ranged from federal and state regulations to the best ways to keep fish healthy, control the amount and time of their feeding, and handle harvest and post-harvest seafood. The idea is that compiling and sharing the best ways to manage hatcheries, aquaculture feeds, production, and more will continually increase seafood quality, safety, and supplies—and as a result, US seafood sales.
“BMPs, from our perspective, are all-encompassing for aquaculture,” says Schwarz, who organized and led the BMP training workshop. Schwarz stresses the important relationship between BMPs and aquaculture sustainability.
“You need to do things right for the environment, you need to do things right for food quality and safety, and you need to do things right for workers’ safety—we encompass all of this in BMPs, so we’re holistic in our approach,” he says. The holistic approach of BMPs is “like a toolbox that you can use for your facility or for getting started in aquaculture,” says Schwarz.
The keys to maintaining fish health are “good cultural practices, good fish handling, and keeping the fish happy,” David Crosby, a fish health specialist from Virginia State University, told attendees at the workshop. According to Crosby, relying on chemicals and antibiotics to maintain fish health and control disease outbreaks isn’t the most effective way to run a fish farm.
“A better approach is using management practices that reduce the risk or likelihood of diseases occurring on the farm” in the first place, he says.
And with healthier fish come better seafood, happier consumers, and a stronger aquaculture industry.
For all their benefits, BMPs are purely voluntary guidance, says Schwarz. “We’re not trying to promote regulation.”
After the workshop, participants gave feedback through surveys. Organizers will use this information to refine the workshops throughout the year, changing the materials, reorganizing, and continuing to get feedback from future attendees.
“The intent,” says Schwarz, “is to have something tight enough that we can break this out potentially into a more expanded regional, or possibly national, education program with other stakeholders.”
Such expansion may happen as soon as the third workshop this year. There, the team plans to expand its reach to more states in the Mid-Atlantic region, including Delaware, Maryland, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, and perhaps New Jersey.
The second BMP workshop will take place October 9th in Southwest Virginia and the third in Northern Virginia later this year.
