Shrimp Is in the Sustainable Seafood Spotlight
All wild-caught shrimp raise concerns about bycatch or fishery management; farmed shrimp are your best environmental choice.
This action guide is the second of a three-part series on sustainable seafood. Shrimp is by far the most popular marine seafood item in the United States. Per person, we eat almost twice as much shrimp as salmon, the second-most popular seafood, and more than twice as much tuna, the third-most-popular food from the sea. Like salmon, shrimp can be wild-caught or farm-raised—and there are super sustainable and extremely unsustainable options if you choose to eat shrimp. Read on to learn the difference so the shrimp buffet can stay on the menu.
As mentioned in part one of this series, Can Eating Salmon Be Sustainable?, the Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch publishes an exceptional set of seafood guides organized by region or by species for the most popular items served in the U.S.—and that list includes shrimp.
I highly recommend the Sustainable shrimp guide by the Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch. Like their Sustainable salmon guide, this is a truly excellent resource.
For wild-caught shrimp, look for the Marine Stewardship Council’s blue MSC certification label. This may be hard to find since Seafood Watch states, “Currently, no wild shrimp fisheries are rated a Best Choice.” You’re more likely to find farmed shrimp that carry the Aquaculture Steward Council’s ASC certification label, which was awarded to a shrimp farm for the first time in 2014. You can also look for the Best Aquacultures Practices (BAP) logo, which certifies that aquaculture practices meet their standards, or the Naturland logo, which certifies both organic aquaculture and sustainable fisheries.
Help! Should I only buy certified shrimp?
Yes. Any wild-caught shrimp that is not MSC-certified may be contributing to the global overfishing problem. But even when shrimp fishermen follow all the rules, they can’t help catching other fish accidentally. Farmed shrimp avoid the bycatch problem, but it’s important to buy shrimp with the ASC, BAP, or Naturland certification label to ensure that you’re supporting shrimp farms that uphold good environmental, health, and labor standards.
Help! What is the difference between a shrimp and a prawn?
Both shrimp and prawns are aquatic crustaceans with ten pairs of legs. According to one foodie site, “Luckily for all of us, in all important ways, prawn and shrimp are essentially identical. In taste, texture, how they behave in recipes, and in all nutritional aspects, you can use them interchangeably without noticing.”
Any swimming shellfish with an elongated body no bigger than a few inches long might be called a shrimp. Most authorities claim that prawns are larger than your average shrimp. In the United States, the term “prawn” tends to refer to species in the Dendrobranchiata suborder; however, in the United Kingdom and Commonwealth nations, prawn is the general term for shrimp.
Environmentally, there is a huge difference among the thousands of species of boneless aquatic animals, both marine and freshwater, that we might call shrimp or prawns. A 2008 study of shrimp fisheries reported that “Slightly less than 300 species of shrimp are of economic interest worldwide.” We might not appreciate the differences, but the shrimp and fishermen do!
Help! What’s wrong with eating wild-caught shrimp?
Wild-caught shrimp fisheries might be unsustainable for three main reasons:
There is too much bycatch—i.e., other species besides shrimp are being caught by accident (and usually killed and tossed overboard).
The targeted shrimp population is overexploited—i.e., shrimp are being removed from the water faster than they can naturally reproduce.
There is too much habitat destruction—i.e., in some parts of the ocean, dragging a bottom trawl to catch shrimp is like clear-cutting a forest to catch squirrels.
Bycatch has long been a problem for shrimp fishermen because to catch small swimming creatures like shrimp, you can’t use tiny hooks, and you can’t use large-mesh nets that allow small fish to escape. As Sustainable Fisheries explains, “Trawling with a small mesh size means any sea creature larger than a shrimp will probably be trapped and accidentally caught as the nets are dragged through the water and brought on board.” Some trawl gear includes a turtle excluder device that helps large animals escape 97 out of 100 times while still capturing smaller fish and shrimp.
Overexploitation leading to population crashes has rarely happened in shrimp fisheries—although it is always a possibility. Scientists suspect that the 2013 Atlantic northern shrimp population collapse in the Gulf of Maine occurred for environmental reasons, such as climate change, rather than overfishing. But wild shrimp populations that are already stressed by other factors, such as habitat loss, may be dragged into oblivion by additional pressure from fishing. With northern shrimp populations failing to rebound, the wild northern Atlantic shrimp fishery remains closed indefinitely.
Bottom trawling means dragging a net along the bottom of the ocean. This can be fine to do on “sandy or muddy seabeds in shallow waters that are regularly exposed to disturbance from strong waves and storms.” In other areas, this practice can destroy coral and deplete seafloor habitat.
Help! Are farmed shrimp bad for the environment, or are they okay?
It depends on the shrimp farm.
Shrimp farms avoid the bycatch problem, tend to protect wild shrimp and fish populations, and reduce the need to trawl large swathes of seafloor. But farming shrimp can degrade habitats in other ways and introduce two new problems:
Overuse of antibiotics.
Concentration of pollution.
While gathering shrimp in the wild often means dragging a net along the bottom and pulling up everything you find in the ocean, farming shrimp requires building shrimp pens—typically somewhere on the coast. As Sustainable Fisheries explains, “Shrimp farming requires brackish water, and mangrove forests are conveniently located in coastal areas that help regulate the pH and salinity necessary for shrimp production.” Historically, shrimp farming has destroyed mangrove forests to build shrimp pens, but new methods use shrimp farming to restore mangroves.
Certified shrimp farms must be managed to perform well in these categories:
Biodiversity: develop and implement an environmental impact assessment to protect and restore critical habitats like mangrove forests.
Feed: minimize the use of wild fish as an ingredient in shrimp feed.
Pollution: test water quality, treat wastewater, and prevent discharge of sludge.
Diseases: develop a health plan for shrimp without prophylactic (before a disease diagnosis) use of medication. Strict conditions govern medication use.
Antibiotics: the ASC Shrimp Standard prohibits the use of antibiotics. If shrimp test positive for antibiotics, they cannot be sold as ASC-certified, and the shrimp farm may be suspended from the ASC program.
Social: consult with local communities to manage conflicts and provide a safe work place without child or forced labor.
Help! Should I eat wild-caught shrimp from North America or farmed shrimp from South America?
The wild Atlantic northern shrimp population has collapsed, so your choices of wild-caught shrimp from North America come from Atlantic stocks off the shore of North Carolina down to Florida and from the Gulf of Mexico or from Pacific stocks. Seafood Watch says that turtle bycatch is an issue for Atlantic shrimp caught in United States waters by skimmer trawl vessels less than 40 feet long.
Shrimp from farms in Ecuador that are ASC-certified are your best choice. You can eliminate bycatch issues, help restore mangrove forests, take pressure off wild shrimp stocks, and support sustainable aquaculture to provide a much-needed inflow of money to a developing country.
What’s Still Ahead on the Pathway…
Last year, we explored the pathway to sustainable movement, energy, and goods. Now, we’re exploring the pathway to sustainable food to transition from the standard American diet to a healthier-for-our-planet plant-centered diet and transition from industrial to regenerative agriculture. This action guide is the second of a three-part series on sustainable seafood. Stay with us on the journey to sustainability as we take action to have a positive impact on our world.
References and Further Reading
Behind the Scenes of the Most Consumed Seafood, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
Can Eating Salmon Be Sustainable?, Fred Horch
Seafood Guides, Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch
Sustainable shrimp guide, Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch
Sustainable salmon guide, Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch
Shrimp/Prawn, Marine Stewardship Council
Nurturing nature and local peoples: the story of a responsible shrimp farm, Aquaculture Stewardship Council
Choose Seafood with Standards, Best Aquaculture Practices
Fish & Seafood, Naturland
Organic Aquaculture — The Way Forward, Naturland
Sustainable Fisheries, Naturland
What Are We Supposed to Think About Shrimp?, The New York Times
What's the Difference Between Shrimp and Prawns?, Food & Wine
Dendrobranchiata, Wikipedia
Shrimp | Crustacean, Britannica
Freshwater Shrimp, Shrimpy Business
Global study of shrimp fisheries, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations
Reducing bycatch in the United States Gulf of Mexico shrimp trawl fishery with an emphasis on red snapper bycatch reduction, Fisheries Research
An Overview of Shrimp and its Sustainability in 2024, Sustainable Fisheries
Turtle Excluder Devices, NOAA
Northern Shrimp Population Collapse Linked to Warming Ocean Temperatures, Squid Predation, NOAA
New England’s decades-old shrimp fishery, a victim of climate change, to remain closed indefinitely, Associated Press
Demersal or bottom trawls, Marine Stewardship Council
The global impact of bottom trawling visualized with data, Sustainable Fisheries
Can shrimp farming restore mangroves? This scientist is making it happen, Conservation International
The Shrimp Standard, ASC
Food for thought! Very educational...