Aquaculture

Farmed Salmon Pre-Harvest Welfare Standards

Pre-harvest welfare in salmon farming encompasses crowding, transfer, and stunning practices that determine the quality of the fish's final experience.

Key Facts

Pre-harvest crowding reduces swimming space to a fraction of normal, causing acute stress
Cortisol spikes from crowding can persist for hours before slaughter
Percussion stunning renders salmon insensible within milliseconds when performed correctly
CO2 stunning is slower and less humane than percussion, but widely used
Electrical stunning as an alternative to CO2 is under development for large-scale use

Welfare Considerations

The pre-harvest period represents the final welfare challenge for farmed salmon. Crowding stress, transfer handling, and inadequate stunning cause significant suffering at the end of life. Percussion stunning best practice - immediate insensibility, verified by gill movement cessation - is the gold standard. Industry adoption of percussion over CO2 stunning is a major welfare improvement that is commercially achievable.

What You Can Do

Support aquaculture welfare standards requiring percussion stunning for salmon harvest
Choose certified salmon from farms with verified humane slaughter standards
Advocate for CO2 stunning to be phased out in favour of percussion alternatives