The Nueva Pescanova project
In 2021 the multinational company Nueva Pescanova presented a €50 million project to create an intensive octopus farm with an annual production capacity of 3,000 tonnes, and asked the competent authorities to authorise the start of operations. This means roughly one million octopuses per year.
As the project documentation shows, the methods envisaged would cause suffering to the animals and have far-reaching environmental consequences, as we discussed in this article.
The report published by Eurogroup for Animals and Compassion in World Farming (CIWF) in 2023, “Uncovering the horrific reality of octopus farming”, set out in detail the concerns surrounding the Nueva Pescanova project. The project documents reveal that the animals would be killed using the “ice slurry” method — which causes a slow and painful death — and that the conditions in which the octopuses would be kept (overcrowded tanks, constantly exposed to light) fail to respect their ethology; moreover, the project is not environmentally sustainable. The Spanish authorities have yet to either grant or refuse authorisation for the project to begin, but according to information made public by CIWF in the report New Threats of Octopus Farm Plans Revealed, the information provided by Nueva Pescanova was deemed insufficient.
Reactions to the project
At international level, the project has met with fierce opposition from numerous non-governmental organisations, which have mobilised both by launching global campaigns against octopus farming and, more specifically, by calling on the authorities of the Canary Islands government to reject the project and on Nueva Pescanova to abandon the plan.
According to CIWF, “The serious problems associated with octopus farming, both environmental and related to animal welfare, make this practice incompatible with the new EU strategic guidelines for the sustainable development of aquaculture”.
The protection of octopuses and the environmental sustainability of their intensive farming have also been the subject of numerous parliamentary questions addressed to the European Commission.
In light of the European Commission’s answers, one cannot but share the observations of authoritative scholarship, according to which “in the specific case of the Nueva Pescanova project, the Commission appears to shy away from any involvement in the matter, leaving it in the hands of the Canary Islands authorities without identifying any impediments that might arise under EU law” (M.C. Maffei, Questo allevamento di polpi non s’ha da fare. Né domani, né mai? Considerazioni sull’applicabilità del diritto internazionale e del diritto dell’Unione europea, in Riv. giur. amb., 2024, p. 827 ff., in particular p. 867).
The European Commission has consistently ruled out the applicability of Directive 98/58/EC – concerning the protection of animals kept for farming purposes – to invertebrates.
Although the Commission has expressly acknowledged that Article 13 TFEU recognises all animals (and therefore octopuses too) as sentient beings, it has at the same time reiterated that, as matters stand, “there are no EU rules on the welfare of farmed molluscs or specific requirements concerning welfare conditions for the slaughter of farmed molluscs, including octopuses”.
Another less than reassuring fact is that the Commission has never prohibited EU funding for octopus farming. A report published by CIWF on public funding devoted to octopus farming research revealed that “the governments of several countries have spent at least €13.3 million in public funds to finance research projects aimed at developing octopus farming”.
Octopus farming bans in the USA
Looking across the Atlantic, several US states are moving to prevent octopus farms from being established. Indeed, in March 2024 the State of Washington passed a bill banning octopus farming. In September 2024, California signed into law a bill prohibiting both octopus farming and the sale, within the state, of products derived from such farms. In addition, in July 2024 a bill known as “OCTOPUS (Opposing the Cultivation and Trade of Octopus Produced through Unethical Strategies)” was introduced in the United States Senate, which would ban not only octopus farming nationwide but also the import of farmed octopus meat.
In a world that must inevitably move towards the recognition of animal rights, the first step is surely to prohibit the farming and exploitation of new species deemed “appetising” in the eyes of the food industry.
