Tuna are among the most commercially valuable fish species, and the methods used to catch and kill them raise serious welfare concerns given evidence of their sentient capacity.
Fish welfare science has documented that tunas experience stress, can learn, and likely experience pain. Industrial capture methods subject fish to massive crowding, physical injury from net walls, and prolonged death from asphyxiation or crushing. The sheer scale of tuna fishing means even marginal improvements in killing methods could reduce suffering for billions of animals annually. Consumer demand for premium certified tuna creates market incentives for welfare improvement.