Shrimp and prawns face welfare considerations in both wild capture and aquaculture settings, with emerging evidence of pain capacity in crustaceans changing ethical frameworks.
Shrimp welfare is an emerging area of concern as evidence of crustacean pain capacity strengthens. The scale of shrimp production — tens of billions of individuals annually — means that even modest individual suffering represents enormous aggregate welfare harm. The absence of welfare standards in producing countries reflects both scientific uncertainty about sentience and economic pressures to ignore it.