CENTRE FOR AQUACULTURE PROGRESS

STARTED: Incubation Program February-March 2024

Co-founder

CE INCUBATION GRANT: $30,000

MONEY FUNDRAISED TO DATE (Aug 2024): $30,000

looking for a further $60,000 by end of 2024

Co-founder

TEAM SIZE (Aug 2023): 2.5 FT, 3 advisors

Co-founder (0.5 FTE)

Supporting change in aquaculture

for consumers, farmers, and fish

DESCRIPTION OF THE INTERVENTION

The Centre for Aquaculture Progress is a new organization focused on improving the aquaculture industry to benefit consumers, farmers, and fish.
It is the first organization dedicated to improving fish welfare in Greece.
The organization’s first campaign will involve advocating for the increased uptake of pre-slaughter electrical stunning for Greek sea bream and sea bass.

BACKGROUND OF THE INTERVENTION

Greece is the largest fish producer in the EU, according to the number of individuals alive at any time. Despite Greece being a significant player in EU aquaculture, no animal welfare organization is currently dedicated to improving the welfare of farmed fish in Greece. Animal welfare organizations in the Mediterranean have identified Greece as a gap which must urgently be filled.
Hundreds of millions of farmed sea bream and sea bass are subjected to extreme suffering in Greece yearly. In the slaughter process, they are unloaded live into an ice slurry and endure a slow and painful death by gradual freezing and suffocation.
While inhumane slaughter is just one of many welfare problems sea bream and sea bass face, it has the most well-researched, tractable and agreed-upon solution: pre-slaughter electrical stunning.

NEAR-TERM PLANS:

The first step for the Centre for Aquaculture Progress is to conduct a gap analysis involving the perspectives of all relevant stakeholders to understand why Greek fish producers are not currently implementing electrical stunners.
Based on the outcomes of this analysis, we will focus on our short-term strategy. We will coordinate with animal welfare organizations in the Mediterranean, retailers, importers, exporters, and stunning equipment manufacturers to sign the necessary corporate agreements for fish producers to implement stunning.
Our co-founder Naomi also plans to relocate to Greece in the coming months.

PREDICTED IMPACT:

Our charity will have a direct impact by increasing the number of fish counterfactually stunned before slaughter.
As we are the only organization focused on fish welfare in Greece, we will fill an important gap in the European animal welfare movement.
In the mid-term, the Centre for Aquaculture Progress will be well-positioned to influence government resources and contribute to EU legislation on fish welfare.

COST-EFFECTIVENESS:

At a minimum, we expect to stun 46 fish per $. In the mid-term we aim to identify and scale even more cost-effective interventions to improve fish welfare.

ROOM FOR MORE FUNDING IN 2023:

We fundraised $30,000 from the Charity Entrepreneurship Seed Network.
At a minimum, we are looking for a further $60,000 to fund our projects and operations until the end of the year. For more background information about our strategy and our intervention feel free to reach out at info@centreforaquacultureprogress.org.