Abstract
China is the biggest provider of aquaculture products, and the industry is still growing rapidly. Further development of the sector will affect the provision of ecosystem services that maintain the livelihood of local populations. In particular, the current size and growth rate of China’s mariculture has raised many environmental concerns, but very few studies of this sector have been conducted to date. Here, we report the resource use in the production of six main Chinese mariculture products (Larimichthys crocea, Apostichopus japonicus, Haliotis spp., Laminaria japonica, Gracilaria spp., Porphyra spp.), taking the city of Ningde as a case study. We used the life cycle assessment framework and the Cumulated Exergy Demand indicator to quantify resource use, and implemented a Monte Carlo simulation where model uncertainty was included using various methods. The mean exergy demand values of the production of one live-weight ton of large yellow croaker, sea cucumber, abalone, laminaria, gracilaria, and porphyra are 106 GJ eq., 65 GJ eq., 126 GJ eq., 0.25 GJ eq., 1.55 GJ eq., and 0.98 GJ eq., respectively. For animal products, 45–90% of the impacts come from the feed requirements, while in seaweed production, 83–99% of the impacts are linked to the fuel used in operation and maintenance activities. Policies oriented toward efficient resource management in the mariculture sector thus should take the farm design, input management, and spatial planning of marine areas as the main targets to guide current practices into more sustainable ones in the future. Improvements in all those aspects can effectively increase resource efficiency in local mariculture production and additionally reduce other environmental impacts both locally and globally.
Highlights
Aquaculture is an important sector in the food industry
The expansion of aquaculture into these areas affects the local environment in several ways
Considerable differences occur in sea cucumber, abalone, and gracilaria production, with a relatively small difference for large yellow croaker (Figure 4)
Summary
It constitutes a source of both income and livelihood to 19.4 million people and it is currently among one of the main sources of growth in the food industry worldwide [1] This is the result of the increase in the demand for aquatic products, the improvement of distribution channels, and the limited capacity of wild fisheries to meet the rising demand. Resource overexploitation and environmental pollution by the development of the aquaculture industry will impair the function of all those ecosystems linked to the supply chain of aquaculture production These negative consequences will have socioeconomic impacts, because the welfare of the people involved in aquaculture activities depends on the productive capacity of these ecosystems to supply aquatic products in adequate quantities and with satisfactory quality. All these environmental impacts may harm these stocks of natural resources and aggravate poverty issues in the long term
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