Atlantic and Pacific mackerel are caught in enormous volumes for human consumption and fishmeal production, with capture stress and slaughter welfare being significant concerns.
Mackerel capture welfare illustrates the challenge of applying welfare consideration to wild-caught marine fish at commercial scale. The welfare of billions of mackerel caught annually receives almost no regulatory attention despite evidence that fish experience noxious stimuli. Purse seine capture concentrates fish at high densities, causing injury and acute stress before suffocation on ice or live transfer to processing. While the scale of wild-catch fish welfare is enormous, practical interventions including rapid chilling immediately after capture and development of large-scale stunning systems represent achievable improvements that some progressive fisheries are beginning to implement.