OUR IMPACT
Note: In India, we primarily help fish through the Alliance for Responsible Aquaculture.
In Portugal, we worked with one producer to improve welfare.
In the Philippines, we helped fish through our Farmer Engagement Project.
Fish Potentially Helped
This includes all the fish we have helped already.
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1.620M
Fish potentially helped through welfare improvements
Last updated: September 21, 2023
1.3 fish potentially helped per 1 dollar
130 fish potentially helped per 100 dollars
How we define fish potentially helped
In “fish potentially helped,” we include all the fish living in a fish farm where 1) we have implemented a welfare improvement that we believe otherwise would not have been implemented, and 2) we feel ≥80% confident that the welfare improvement made a positive impact on the fish. To get the number of fish helped per dollar, we divide the sum of fish living in a pond with welfare improvements by the total expenses we have had as a charity so far.
Currently, most of the number of fish we help results from working with farmers through the Alliance for Responsible Aquaculture. Specifically, they live on farms where we believe we have been responsible for stocking density and/or water quality improvements. Apart from that, we work with international farmers to implement targeted welfare improvements.
Examples of fish potentially helped:
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A farmer in India planned to stock 3,500 fish per acre. After working with us, he realized the benefits of stocking at most 3,000 fish per acre. Stocking fewer fish gives the fish in the pond more space, which in turn helps curb disease outbreaks and poor water quality. Thus, the fish in this pond live better lives.
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In another pond in India, we detected dissolved oxygen levels lower than specified in the ARA commitment. We advised the farmer to remove debris at his pond and turn on his aerators. The follow-up measurements showed a significant increase in dissolved oxygen, giving the fish in his pond better lives.
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We visited a farm in Portugal and conducted a welfare assessment of their various production steps. Among other things, we suggested more welfare-friendly handling and capture to decrease injuries, and the farmer reduced stocking densities to give fish more space.
Also see Limitations of our numbers below.
Shrimp Potentially Helped
Note: We are much less certain about the number of shrimp helped and the impact our interventions have on shrimps' lives.
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1.40M
Shrimp potentially helped through welfare improvements
Last updated: September 21, 2023
1 shrimp potentially helped per 1 dollar
How we define shrimp potentially helped
In “shrimp potentially helped,” we include all the shrimp living in a pond where we have implemented a welfare improvement that we believe otherwise would not have been implemented. To get the number of shrimp helped per dollar, we divide the sum of shrimp living in a pond with welfare improvements by the total expenses we have had as a charity so far.
Currently, most of the number of shrimp we help results from working with farmers through the Alliance for Responsible Aquaculture. Specifically, they live on farms where we believe we have been responsible for stocking density and/or water quality improvements targeting the fish in the pond. As such, the impact we have on shrimp is indirect through targeting fish.
Limitations of our numbers
1.
We don’t (currently) assess magnitude. The numbers of fish potentially helped do not consider the degree to which they were helped. While our welfare improvements theoretically should improve fish welfare, given the on-the-ground implementation difficulties and our current lack of a rigorous impact analysis, we are still significantly uncertain about the magnitude of our per-fish impact. Thus, it is unfortunately possible that our improvements are currently only having a trivial impact. To address this uncertainty, we plan to conduct an impact assessment in the coming year.
2.
We generalize. It is possible that some fish counted may not have suffered in the absence of our intervention. For example, water quality is dynamic depending on where fish are in the pond. Thus, we do not know with certainty that all individuals would have suffered under water quality levels we deem inadequate.
3.
We only count the fish we know of. It is common for there to be fish within a pond that have not been intentionally stocked by the farmer, such as invasive fish who enter the system through in-flow or fish that were not successfully removed in previous harvests. We expect that in almost all cases our improvements will also positively improve these fishes’ lives. However, we do not currently have a way to account for our impact on these individuals, so they are excluded.
4.
We focus primarily on fish, not shrimp. We work with farmers farming fish or shrimp, or both in polyculture. Thus, our welfare improvements affect both fish and shrimp. We see the fish lives we improve as our primary area of impact because our interventions are targeting fish species. We are even less certain of the impact we have on shrimp, even though farmers stock a lot more shrimp in each pond.
5.
We have limited shrimp welfare knowledge. We know much less about shrimp welfare. The focus of our improvements and measurements has been on fish. As such, we are less confident that shrimp have been significantly positively affected by our interventions than we are for fish. However, we are relatively confident that the improvements we make that target fish welfare can benefit shrimp, mainly because improving water quality parameters like dissolved oxygen, temperature, and pH is essential for shrimp welfare.
Thank you for making this impact possible.