A social science and humanities workshop on fish feed. Really?
鈥淒amn it, there is a lot of social science and humanities research on fish feed going on here at UiB that I鈥檓 not even aware of!鈥� This realization hit me in a meeting with colleagues who are part of an informal network of UiB researchers interested in fish feed. To my surprise, the more senior colleagues in this network seemed to be as surprised as I was once we started brainstorming and each of us listed some colleagues and projects at UiB that we had heard of. The only logical consequence of this realization of course 鈥� at least when you are an academic 鈥� is to organize a workshop and bring these people together.
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The only logical consequence of this realization of course 鈥� at least when you are an academic 鈥� is to organize a workshop and bring these people together.
And this is exactly what we did. On the 9th and 10th of December 2024 this workshop took place here at UiB. With support from UiB Ocean we also invited key colleagues from outside of Bergen.
The basic idea of the workshop was to take time out of our busy schedules, talk about different projects on fish feed, and in doing so start a long-term conversation across disciplines about epistemic, technological, ecological, economic, political and normative issues that get entangled with the production and use of fish feed.
Debates and controversies about fish feed in Norway
The workshop was opened by a deep dive into the history of debates and controversies about fish feed in Norway from B氓rd Hob忙k (NIVA / University of Oslo). In his talk, B氓rd Hob忙k nicely showed how today鈥檚 debates and arguments about fish feed are rooted in 鈥� and in some cases even mirror 鈥� historical discussions. Ideas about 鈥減rotein imperialism鈥� for example go back decades, to the 1970s. It was fascinating to hear about these controversies and debates and how they still influence how we think about fish feed today.
The production and use of fishmeal and fish oil for feed
The introductory keynote was followed by a set of talks that directed attention to issues with the use of small fish for producing fishmeal and fish oil for feed. How do Norwegian attempts to create more sustainable aquacultures affect fisheries all over the world?
This part of the workshop culminated in a second keynote by Joeri Scholtens from the University of Amsterdam on the production and use of fishmeal and fish oil for feed and the challenges that come with that. How are the lines between food and feed drawn? On what grounds? With which consequences?
Joeri Scholtens raised five concerns about fishmeal and fish oil: it is undermining food security, there are ecological issues with the fishing, the fishmeal and fish oil factories also are polluters, there are issues with employment structures in West Africa and South Asia, and there are concerns about animal welfare.
Funding initiative about sustainable feed
From discussions about fishmeal and fish oil we moved to a topic that has the feed-research-community buzzing right now: the Samfunnsoppdrag b忙rekraftig f么r, a huge new research funding initiative coordinated by the Research Council of Norway. Benjamin D. Smith from the University of Oslo talked about an ongoing evaluation of this mission and about various challenges that this mission wants to adress. These challenges include food security and self sufficiency, potential environmental impacts, and question about which resources should be used for food and which for feed.
New projects on salmon aquaculture and salmon feed
During the workshop we also learned about some exciting new projects on salmon aquaculture and salmon feed: Ernesto S茅man talked about his project on the history of aquaculture in Chile and Katharina Sass introduced her work on the 鈥渟almon elites鈥�, which is starting now in 2025. Learning about these projects, the workshop crowd got convinced that (at least) the research future looks bright.
What problems are we actually trying to solve?
The second day of the workshop directed attention to one of the more challenging aspects of fish feed research (and research in general): collaborations between social science and humanities (SSH) scholars and scientists from the natural and life sciences. Erik-Jan Lock, Director of the Department of Fish Nutrition and Feed Technology and Roger Strand from UiB鈥檚 Centre for the Study of the Sciences and Humanities talked about their collaboration in the project Aquafly.
Starting from this concrete project, they discussed the objectives and challenges of such collaborations. For Erik-Jan Lock, working together with SSH scholars provides an opportunity to take a step back and think about the questions we are asking and the problems we are solving. In his experience, a narrow focus on finding solutions keeps us from asking the question 鈥渨hat problem are we actually trying to solve?鈥�
Roger Strand reminded us that such collaborations are difficult, especially when the aim is to address tough questions and to go beyond mere box ticking. Making such collaborations work requires trust and time, in some cases years (or even decades) of being in contact or being aware of each other鈥檚 work before an actual project materializes.
A hopeful note
The workshop concluded on a high and hopeful note with a set of presentations from junior colleagues who talked about their ongoing MA and PhD projects. The future is bright.
For me the workshop ended in a similar place to where it started: with a confirmation that there is indeed lot of social science and humanities research on fish feed going on.
What the workshop added for me is a renewed confidence that the many angles from which different colleagues tackle the issue are all contributing something unique and useful to a broader debate about fish feed, aquaculture and sustainability.
