Billions of aquatic invertebrates including crabs, lobsters, and shrimp are harvested by commercial fishing with minimal attention to welfare. Evidence-based practices can reduce their suffering.
Aquatic invertebrate welfare in fisheries is at the earliest stages of policy development despite the enormous scale of harvest. The evidence for crustacean sentience is sufficient to warrant precautionary welfare measures, yet most commercial capture and killing methods were designed purely for efficiency without welfare consideration. Crabs and lobsters in pot fisheries can experience extended confinement, injury from trap mechanisms, and the stress of capture before killing. Stunning methods that produce rapid insensibility before killing exist but are not widely adopted because they add time and cost to processing. As the scientific consensus on crustacean sentience strengthens, the ethical case for welfare improvements becomes more urgent.