The Future of Aquaculture

Farmed fish, shellfish, and crustaceans represent almost one-third of the seafood we eat today. With worldwide demand for seafood on the rise and most wild fisheries going under, aquaculture has become a lucrative business. The United Nations is projecting a 40 million ton global seafood shortage by 2030. Dr. Schreibman envisions a day when fish farming throughout New York City -- using systems scalable to tight urban spaces-- will replace resource-wasting importing as a ready source of local seafood. He's also worked on developing the method to create self-replenishing food systems in space. Container systems such as the one Dr. Martin P. Schreibman has created offer an alternative to fish farming coastal waters, a problematic industry (one being heavily promoted by the Bush administration -- see The National Offshore Aquaculture Act of 2007). For example, salmon are raised by the thousands in net pens, producing a corresponding load of polluting feces; diseases spread quickly through the net pens; antibiotics used to treat the diseases spread into wild waters and help breed antibiotic-resistant organisms.