Total fish production going up because of aquaculture

Tweet The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) has also recently published a report which provides more detail on global trends that reinforce the importance of developing aquaculture. In 2004, capture fisheries and aquaculture supplied the world with about 106 million tonnes of food fish, providing the highest apparent per capita supply on record. Of this total, aquaculture accounted for 43 percent.

Preliminary estimates for 2005 suggest that total world fishery production reached almost 142 million tonnes. This would represent an increase of over 1 million tonnes compared with 2004, as well as a new record level of production.

Aquaculture continues to grow more rapidly than all other animal food-producing sectors, with a global average annual growth rate of 8.8 percent per year since 1970, compared with only 1.2 percent for capture fisheries and 2.8 percent for terrestrial farmed meat production systems.

Aquaculture production in 2004 was reported to be 45.5 million tonnes with a value of US$63.3 billion or, if aquatic plants are included, 59.4 million tonnes with a value of US$70.3 billion.

The FAO also see biotech (GM food) as being a key part of solving food scarcity