Hundreds of billions of invertebrates are farmed annually for food, feed, and silk. As evidence of invertebrate sentience grows, the welfare of these animals demands serious consideration from producers, regulators, and consumers.
Invertebrate welfare sits at the frontier of animal welfare science. The challenge is uncertainty: we lack the behavioural, neurological, and evolutionary frameworks needed to confidently assess the welfare states of most farmed invertebrate species. For crustaceans, evidence for nociception is strong — they show protective responses to tissue damage, demonstrate avoidance learning, and have opioid receptors. For insects, the picture is more contested; evidence suggests some capacity for nociception but the question of whether they experience conscious suffering remains open. The precautionary principle — that where credible evidence of sentience exists, welfare should be protected — is increasingly applied. Practical welfare improvements being developed for farmed insects include temperature-based euthanasia methods that may be less aversive than current practices, and stocking density and substrate recommendations to reduce injury and stress.