170 facilities were certified by Best Aquaculture Practices (BAP) in the first half of 2017, bringing the total number of certifications in the programme to 1,674 worldwide.
The Global Aquaculture Alliance announced that of those 170 new facilities, 42 are processing plants, 100 are farms, 13 are hatcheries and 15 are feed mills. Shrimp farms (46) and salmon farms (33) represented the majority of the 100 farms certified by the programme.
The BAP certification programme has more than doubled in size in the past two years, growing from about 700 facilities at the end of 2014 to 1,500-plus facilities by the end of 2016.
There was a total of 388 processing plants, 1,029 farms, 173 hatcheries and 87 feed mills in the programme at the end of June.
BAP-certified processing plants collectively produce about 2bn kilograms (2m metric tons) of shrimp, salmon, tilapia, pangasius and other farmed seafood species annually. BAP-certified farms produce more than 168m kilograms (1.68m metric tons) of product.
BAP’s aquaculture standards encompass environmental and social responsibility, food safety, animal health and welfare and traceability. It is the only certification scheme to cover the entire aquaculture production chain.
