Challenges and Pathways to Resilient Shrimp Production

Description

Often overlooked in policy and research landscapes, aquatic foods are a vital component of food systems. They supply around 20% of global animal protein and have lower environmental impacts than many other food sources. Beyond protein, they are a critical source of micronutrients, especially important to vulnerable populations, and are a cornerstone of global cultures, diets, economies, and livelihoods. Despite this, the climate and biological emergency, disease outbreaks, precarious supply chains, economic insecurity and social shifts pose significant challenges to the future of this industry.

As one of just four internationally traded aquatic foods, our project looks at shrimp as an exemplar to develop pathways to more resilient production by unpacking the complex and overlapping challenges of climate, disease, economics, supply chains, and waste. Led by Professor Chris Elliott of The Institute of Global Food Security at Queen’s University, Belfast, we have partnered with research institutions and companies in the ASEAN region to develop a transdisciplinary working group to understand how technologies might mix with landscape, business, economic, and policy interventions to address these challenges.

One clear conclusion so far is that despite the extensive challenges faced by the shrimp industry, many solutions already exist. What is less clear is how this wide mix of solutions might overlap to address multiple resilience challenges in a way that fosters more benefits than trade-offs. How these solutions might be incentivised and implemented across a huge network of small, resource-constrained farms is our focus. We use a Living Lab framework to put farmers and processors at the centre of our project to collectively design new model shrimp farms of the future, with a view to shaping policy and practice relevant to the global shrimp industry and beyond. As our project progresses, we are enlisting companies, researchers, and non-profit organisations to join our project and support us to co-create research-driven solutions that can be applied across different scales, timeframes, and contexts.

Period	Nov 2023
Event title	ASEAN-ASSET 2023: Global Summit on the Future of Future Food
Event type	Conference
Location	BangkokShow on map
Degree of Recognition	International