Farmed shrimp are produced in enormous numbers under conditions that may cause significant suffering if, as growing evidence suggests, they are sentient beings capable of experiencing pain.
Shrimp welfare represents one of the most numerically significant and least-addressed areas of farmed animal welfare. If shrimp are sentient - which evidence increasingly suggests - then the conditions of their farming and slaughter represent a massive scale of potential suffering. Eyestalk ablation in particular is a painful procedure performed on broodstock to increase egg production. The Shrimp Welfare Project and others are working to develop and promote higher-welfare shrimp farming practices.