Best Management Practices In Aquaculture

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Introduction

In aquaculture as in any industry, the objective is to produce a product, goods or services with minimal effort, minimal input, and minimal costs. Best management practices (BMPs) have been developed and adopted, by producers and government organisations and non-government organisations to attempt to achieve these aims. One consequence is to reduce environmental impacts to a point where in recent years this has become one of the main driving forces for BMP implementation in achieving a continuous programme of environmental performance improvements (Clay.2008). Best management practice implemented by producers, implies that the producer does everything to avoid the worst impacts of production, when reality suggests that there are a range of performance improvements being implemented that affect environmental performance, some better than others and most falling in between best and worst (Clay.2008). A best practise today will be superseded by something

Some radical NGOs attempted to change consumer perceptions of aquaculture through methods such as boycotting consumption of certain species whilst more moderate environmental NGOs focused on efforts to persuade aquaculture organisations to promote social and environmental responsibilities in aquaculture practices (Boyd.2008). BMPs evolved as a management tool for addressing each issue of concern during the process of producing aquaculture products in an economic and ecological manner. Some BMPs are mandatory and governed by legislation which requires compliance and others are voluntary and are normally put in place by the