New technologies including computer vision, acoustic monitoring, and biosensors are enabling real-time welfare assessment in aquaculture for the first time.
Welfare monitoring technology addresses a fundamental limitation of fish welfare assessment: the difficulty of observing millions of individual fish in underwater cages. Technology that detects welfare indicators across the population - swimming depth distribution, feeding activity, response to stimuli - enables management interventions before welfare problems escalate. The development and adoption of these technologies represents genuine progress toward better-evidenced welfare management.