Fighting Industrial Aquaculture in the Gulf of Mexico
CFS successfully challenged the government's attempt to authorize industrial fish farming in the Gulf of Mexico, securing landmark court victories that prevented the creation of a new aquaculture industry in U.S. federal waters for the first time.
What Was the Gulf Aquaculture Proposal?
The federal government sought to establish industrial offshore fish farming in the Gulf of Mexico through regulations that would have authorized large net-pen aquaculture operations in federal ocean waters. The intent was to use the Gulf as a test region for similar permitting schemes in all U.S. ocean waters.
The program would have allowed commercial fish farms to raise millions of pounds of fish annually in offshore waters, creating risks for marine ecosystems, wild fisheries, coastal communities, and endangered species. Unlike existing aquaculture operations in the U.S. — the majority of which are nearshore operations for shellfish and shrimp — the government’s proposal would have extended industrial fish farms out of state coastal zones and into deep ocean waters offshore for the production of large marine finfish such as tuna and amberjack.
Gulf Aquaculture Litigation
In 2016, Center for Food Safety filed suit on behalf of a coalition of fishing, conservation, and public interest organizations challenging federal regulations that would have authorized industrial offshore aquaculture in the Gulf of Mexico.
Plaintiffs argued that the federal government lacked authority under existing fisheries laws to create and regulate a new offshore fish farming industry in federal waters.
In 2018, a federal district court agreed and struck down the regulations. In 2020, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit upheld that decision, ruling that Congress had never granted the agency authority to permit offshore aquaculture in federal waters.
The decisions blocked the first attempt to establish large-scale industrial fish farming in U.S. federal ocean waters and set an important precedent that such authority must come from Congress. This work established a landmark legal victory protecting our oceans and fishing communities.
Gulf Aquaculture and Our Work
Industrial fish farms can contribute to pollution, disease transmission, escaped fish, habitat degradation, and impacts to wild marine species.
Offshore aquaculture can create economic pressures for commercial and recreational fisheries while competing for public ocean space.
Center for Food Safety led a coalition challenge to federal offshore aquaculture regulations and successfully argued that the government lacked authority to establish the industry under existing law.
Federal courts ruled that existing fisheries statutes do not authorize industrial offshore aquaculture in federal waters, preventing the creation of a new federally permitted fish farming industry in the Gulf of Mexico.
