Oppose the OCTOPUS Act
Senators Whitehouse and Murkowski have introduced S.4810 Opposing the Cultivation and Trade of Octopus Produced through Unethical Strategies Act (OCTOPUS Act) that would ban octopus farming in the United States and the importation of farmed octopus products.
The National Aquaculture Association is opposed to an octopus farming ban primarily due to it’s potential to trigger additional farmed species bans over time that could severely impact U.S. farmers. Click here for a NAA position paper opposing the ban. We speak to the several criticisms raised by activists if (a huge if for the foreseeable future) octopus farming would become feasible including the care of animals on farms.
What is Up with the OCTOPUS Act and a Farming Prohibition?
The driver for this Act are false and exaggerated concerns by animal rights activists for the care and well-being of octopus on farms and a variety of unfounded, dire predictions which are illegal under existing federal and state regulations.
The State of Washington has passed and signed legislation to ban octopus farming. California has a bill well on the way to passing. Hawaii’s legislation died in committee because octopus is a prized seafood within the islands. Supposedly legislation was introduced in Oregon and Connecticut, but we haven’t been able to track those bills down yet.
This effort by animal rights activist was triggered by Inicio - Nueva Pescanova, a wild and farmed seafood business based in Spain, claiming a large, indoor octopus farm will be built at the Port of Las Palmas on Gran Canaria Island. The fact is octopus farming is currently not practical or feasible. Early planktonic life stages have not successfully been grown even in a lab, nor have feed formulations been developed for these early life stages or for grow-out. As farmers know, production within a farm environment is even more challenging.
Work is ongoing in New Zealand, Korea, Spain and other countries to solve these challenges. Why is that? The market demand for octopus is growing and wild stocks are declining. Given the fishing areas for octopus are poorly managed or not managed at all, a solution to conserve wild octopuses is to: 1) farm the animals and bring down price and demand for wild sourced octopus and 2) develop and refine animal husbandry to support rebuilding at-risk populations.
If you have questions or comments, please contact the NAA Office at naa@nationalaquaculture.org.