Fish farms try to hook 'organic' label

By ASHLEY GOSIK
Cox News Service

WASHINGTON — The National Organics Standards Board opened a week of meetings Tuesday on the question of whether farmed fish should qualify for the federal government's official organic label.

Opponents say that would violate the Agriculture Department's own standards. They claim the fish meal and fish oil used in aquaculture concentrates pollutants such as PCBs and mercury that are hazardous to human health. They also say the most common method of fish farming, called open pen net farming, is inconsistent with the principles of organic agriculture.

The industry contends that a U.S. organic standard for farmed fish is needed to help producers improved their operations and compete against foreign producers whose own standards are suspect.

At stake for the farmers is a foothold in a U.S. organic food market estimated at $15.5 billion in 2006 and enjoying double-digit annual growth.

Already, consumers see plenty of fish in the stories labeled "organic," but none with the official USDA label. That's because foreign producers are allowed to sport labels awarded by their own countries — much to the alarm of domestic fish farmers.

In March, the Organic Standards Board voted to temporarily exclude all U.S.-farmed fish from the organic standard. It also asked for public comment on the two main issues to be debated this week:

— Fish meal and fish oil produced from wild animals. The board's proposed rule would allow no more than 24 percent of a farmed fish's feed to be made up of meal or oil from wild fishes. Even this percentage would have to be phased out after seven years.

— Open-net pens. The board proposed to allow them "where water depth, current velocities and direction, and other factors" keep waste solids from building up on the sea floor underneath.

"We want to make sure that everybody's heard," said Joan Schaffer, a board spokeswoman.

A leading opponent of aquaculture, the activist group Food and Water Watch, says in a new report that the industry is not sustainable, one of the principles of organic agriculture. The group claims that it takes two to six pounds of wild fish to produce one pound of some types of farmed fish, and that the industry already consumes 80 percent of the world's fish oil and half the fish meal each year.

Those concerned about the impact of large pens anchored offshore cite several potential problems they say suggest such farms don't meet organic principles: pollution from the farms, impact on predator populations, risks from diseases and parasites, and threats to wild stocks from escaped fish.

On the other side of the debate, some farmed-fish experts emphasize the benefits of using fish meal and fish oil in feed.

Fish meal and fish oil have "high biological values," Brad Hicks of the Pacific Organic Seafood Association wrote in a report to be presented at the symposium. "Fish oil has very high concentrations of unsaturated long-chain fatty acids which have many health-promoting properties."

According to one study, two of the United States' four offshore aquaculture facilities reported that its fish contained no detectable levels of harmful contaminants.

In his report, Hicks pointed to the success of offshore aquaculture around the world as proof that the industry is sustainable.

Globally, aquaculture brings in $78 billion each year, with Asia producing four-fifths of the world's farmed fish.

Hicks also pointed out that half of the all the fish imported into the United States are produced in offshore aquaculture facilities.