Sea cucumber aquaculture is one of the fastest-growing mariculture sectors globally, driven by demand from Asian food markets, but the welfare status of these invertebrates remains poorly understood and largely unregulated.
Sea cucumber welfare sits in genuine scientific uncertainty. These animals have the neurological apparatus for nociception but lack the centralised nervous system architecture associated with conscious pain experience in vertebrates. The precautionary welfare principle — applied increasingly to crustaceans and insects — suggests that this uncertainty warrants caution rather than assumption of non-sentience. Practices that would cause clear suffering in animals we are more confident are sentient, including evisceration by handling stress and overcrowding to oxygen depletion, deserve review under a precautionary framework. The rapid growth of the sector without welfare oversight mirrors the trajectory of other aquaculture species before welfare science caught up — proactive research and engagement now is preferable to reactive regulation later.