Shrimp farming struggles under its own toxic burden

As though you needed more reason to eat shrimp from local Lowcountry waters.

A highlight from a report in Harper's Weekly about the dire state of many foreign shrimp farming operations:

An estimated 90 percent of Mexico’s shrimp farms are on the Sea of Cortez, and they have struggled for years with a series of diseases. The recent news displays another problem that I didn’t mention, but that is equally problematic: cramming thirty shrimp into one square meter is a little like putting thousands of people into unsanitary prison camps. Disease runs rampant. ...

Though the issues are different in nature, both suggest that the United States can ill afford to ban wild-caught shrimp from Mexico; it is the seventh-largest foreign source of shrimp for the United States, and the nearest major supplier. Already the U.S. government has signaled that it might wave tariffs for several large Asian shrimp providers who have been hampered by early mortality syndrome. The reason for this friendliness is that we need these shrimp farms in order to meet America’s massive appetite for its favorite seafood. But as farms attempt to fulfill that demand, they will have to find better ways of warding off disease.

Take a read of the whole article here.

Worth keeping mind that it's not just good for the local economy and your tast buds when given the option to buy local shrimp.

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