Shrimp are farmed in enormous numbers globally with virtually no welfare regulation, and emerging evidence of their sentience raises urgent questions about killing methods and treatment.
The welfare of farmed shrimp represents one of the largest unaddressed animal welfare concerns by number of individuals affected. Scientific uncertainty about the degree of shrimp sentience must be weighed against the precautionary principle given billions of animals involved. Rapid chilling before processing is considered more humane than boiling or live processing without prior stunning. Industry and regulators are beginning to engage with this issue, but progress is slow relative to the scale of potential suffering.