More shrimp are produced by aquaculture than any other farmed animal by count. Their welfare at this enormous scale raises significant ethical questions that are only beginning to be addressed.
Farmed shrimp welfare represents one of the largest-scale welfare challenges in animal agriculture, with hundreds of billions of individuals involved in production with essentially no welfare protections. The practice of eyestalk ablation — crushing or cutting the eyestalks of female broodstock to induce egg production — is a severe mutilation causing significant tissue damage with no analgesia. Evidence from behavioral and neurological research increasingly supports the position that shrimp experience pain-like states. Effective humane slaughter methods for shrimp are technically feasible but rarely implemented. Welfare standards for shrimp are urgently needed given the extraordinary numbers of animals involved.