Sea Cages are in Bad Company

We all know a harmful industry when we see it.

It’s one that prioritizes corporate profit over environmental protection. It jeopardizes the health of its workers and sacrifices the wellbeing of their communities. It promotes the overconsumption of harmful substances and turns a blind eye to consumer protections.^{1, 2}

It looks like the petroleum industry, the tobacco industry, the alcohol industry, fast fashion and gambling. It is also shaped like a sea cage.

Thousands of these underwater mesh enclosures litter our oceans, with significant environmental and social consequences, positioning aquaculture as a harm industry.^{3, 4}

These sea cages allow waste, excess feed, chemicals and diseases to flow directly into surrounding marine environments, degrading water quality and harming wild fish populations. ⁵

Escaped farmed salmon can interbreed with wild salmon, weakening genetic diversity and threatening already fragile populations.^{6, 7, 8, 9}

Additionally, sea cages are often established near coastal communities, impacting local fisheries, which depend on healthy ecosystems for their livelihoods.^{1, 5}

While aquaculture companies often frame salmon farming as a boost to local economies, especially in rural and coastal areas, the full picture is less rosy. Sea cage farming can cause damage to other fisheries. For example, in 2013, aquaculture companies were charged with dumping large amounts of illegal chemical and pesticide sea lice treatments that killed nearby lobster populations in New Brunswick, Canada.¹⁰

In many communities, profits from open net-pen salmon aquaculture operations flow out to large multinational corporations, while the long-term economic risks—declining tourism, reduced wild fisheries, and degraded marine ecosystems—remain local.

The industry’s growth has been made possible through active repositioning of the governing body to simultaneously serve as regulator, investor, and development advocate for the private sector. Governments have redirected public resources and regulatory flexibility in order to create favorable conditions for private aquaculture companies. This is especially problematic when decisions are made based on economic interests alone.¹¹

By prioritizing industrial production over ecological sustainability, the sea cage industry poses a serious threat to marine ecosystems, traditional fisheries and the communities that rely on them.^{12, 13, 14}

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