Projects - BENEFISH

BENEFISH is an EU funded Strategic Targeted Research Project (STREP), which will explore the benefits and costs of welfare measures in aquaculture production systems. The project strategy is to define a widely-applicable set of operational welfare actions and indicators that can be connected to measurable consequences in production and extended to effects on value chain and changes in consumer perception. BENEFISH will produce a scientific basis for comparing the biological effects and monetary influences of various welfare measures by developing a high-level decision analysis model. The main objectives of BENEFISH are to:

  1. Use a set of widely applicable operational welfare indicators, define relationships between selected welfare control measures and their consequences for production, quality and consumer perception
  2. Estimate the costs and benefits of potential welfare control measures and their documentation through case studies,
  3. Develop a decision analysis model allowing comparison between various welfare control measures on the basis of their biological and monetary consequences.

These objectives will be achieved by mining existing data resources, supplementary collection of data from representative farming systems and construction of production and bio-economic models.  The project consists of nine work packages that are divided into project management and three RTD blocks:

  1. Welfare actions and indicators,
  2. Consequences of indicators in the value chain, and
  3. Welfare utilities and bio-economic models.

BENEFISH draws together a consortium of partners and stakeholders with a diverse range of backgrounds and expertise to address the challenge of quantifying the benefits of welfare interventions in aquaculture. The consortium will not only consist of research institutions providing complementary expertise for the current field but also industry stakeholders representing different stages of the aquaculture value chain, welfare-orientated NGOs and quality mark certification bodies. BENEFISH has direct links to ongoing relevant EU initiatives concerning fish welfare. The project capitalises on the fact that members of this consortium have already completed or are currently undertaking a wide range of research focusing on specific aspects of welfare in commercially valuable aquaculture species has already been completed (or is the subject of on-going research). Added value will accrue to the available European funding through the project’s use of participants existing data and through leveraging existing links with commercial organisation and research initiatives at a national and international level.