A new publication from Feedback, a UK- and Netherlands-based environmental campaign group working towards a food system that “nourishes both people and our planet”, contends that the Norwegian salmon industry not only extracts nutrition and threatens food security and livelihoods in West Africa but also destroys wild fish populations.
The report, titled “Blue Empire: How the Norwegian salmon industry extracts nutrition and undermines livelihoods in West Africa”, exposes how the Norwegian salmon industry’s promise to feed the world is both unfounded and unrealistic. Instead, it shows how the industry’s voracious appetite for wild-caught fish is threatening food security and livelihoods in West Africa, as well as decimating wild fish populations. It offers recommendations to the Norwegian government and calls on the industry to change its practices to end the salmon’s industry’s blue empire.
The report shows how the expansion of the Norwegian salmon farming industry has come at the expense of communities and fish populations in the Global South. While salmon producers tout their sustainability credentials, the industry’s inefficient and wasteful use of finite natural resources is driving the loss of livelihoods and exacerbating malnutrition in several nations, including The Gambia, Senegal and Mauritania. The report argues that the Norwegian salmon industry is not so much leading a ‘blue revolution’ as establishing a ‘blue empire’.
The “Blue Empire” report is available at https://feedbackglobal.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/Feedback-BlueEmpire-Jan24.pdf