Exposing Aquaculture’s Cruelty with Laura Lee Cascada

I, I can't wait to talk to her because this is, you know, as we'll talk about, a topic that's for some reason still not nearly explored enough. So thankfully Laura exists and is, is exploring it to say the very least.

Before we get to that, just a quick reminder about the Our Hen House podcasts. Rising Anxieties comes out on Tuesdays, The Hen Report on Thursdays, and the long form interview, that's this, on Fridays, and bonus for Flock members comes out on Mondays. We're a podcast, we're also on YouTube, so subscribe and hit like wherever you listen. So without further ado, welcome back to the Our Hen House podcast, Laura Lee.

Laura Lee Cascada: Thank you so much. I'm so excited to be here again.

Jasmin Singer: I am too. This is like, this is a topic that I am endlessly intrigued by, and fascinated by the fact that like, you know, I've been working in animal rights for decades and it's still something that there, there's just not enough attention put on it. So I, I imagine that most people listening are somewhat familiar with aquaculture, but I imagine, like me, a lot of them are not fully familiar with what's happening and the speed with which it is happening. So can you just start by giving us the, the sky high picture of what aquaculture is and its current size and status? And then we'll get into details.

Laura Lee Cascada: Sure. Yeah. So back in, around the late, I would say, 1960s, 1970s, when overfishing started to become really a huge problem on the global scale, the aquaculture industry, which is basically the idea of raising animals, um, in a confined area for food, started to grow. And the whole supposed goal was that they would replace overfishing by growing animals like salmon and tilapia in these cages or in these pens, and be able to produce them on a mass scale, uh, to sort of displace overfishing.

And as I'll get into it, that hasn't really worked out. But the idea is that they're basically factory farms on the water and come with a lot of the same problems that, that land-based farms do.

Mariann Sullivan: So it's totally been promoted and I think it in most people's minds, this is what it is, that it's a, it's this way to save the oceans and, and, and, and get the, the populations of, of ocean dwelling animals back up to where they should be. People think of it as kind of benign. So, so can you tell us why that's totally not the truth?

Laura Lee Cascada: Yeah. Well that is by design. The industry has really used a lot of greenwashing or blue washing, whatever you wanna call it, to convey that and to really help itself grow and convince consumers and places that serve food, like universities, that they're doing a good thing by buying farmed fish. Um, but there are so many reasons, which my project kind of sheds light on, as to why this is false and greenwashing, and we talk about five different main myths that I can go into more. But essentially the aquaculture industry is telling us that it's displacing over fishing. That's the biggest one. And in reality, it's driving more fishing because to feed a lot of these fish who are popular as food in the US and other global north countries, you have to use wild caught fish.

And so it's adding more and more pressure and there's been no evidence that eating farmed fish has actually displaced eating wild fish. So the two are basically growing together in parallel.

Mariann Sullivan: So is that because of the, the, the use of, of the, the wild caught fish as food or just because, because it's made fish more popular and so, uh, so people are, are, I mean, say salmon, I don't know, uh, whatever fish, I know salmon are commonly farmed. So is the use of farm salmon growing the population, uh, the popularity of salmon in a way that's causing more fishing of, of wild salmon as well?

Laura Lee Cascada: Yeah, so there's two kind of things at play here. One is what I just spoke about, that salmon need wild caught fish to feed them. And so that intensifies pressure, especially in areas like West Africa and South America where they're catching these small fish to feed the salmon. But then as you have picked up on, the second issue is that farmed fishing has made sort of the idea of eating fish more and more popular because of all of the marketing, because of all the bad science that they're putting out, and essentially has convinced people to eat way more fish.

I mean, we were eating near zero and I mean, in the US, people were eating near zero salmon just 40 years ago, and now it's over three pounds per person, per year. So when people go to the store, they don't know really, or maybe don't care what kind they're buying, but as a result of the aquaculture industry growing so much, um, it has just grown overall fish consumption, wild and farmed.

Mariann Sullivan: So in addition to salmon, are, are most of the fish that are farmed carnivorous, or do some of them eat...? i don't, I have no idea what fish eat, I guess algae or something. Uh uh. Like is, is it mostly that there that we're farming fish that have to eat other fish and that's why, uh, this is such a particular disaster?

Laura Lee Cascada: Well, the most popular ones in countries like the US and other global north countries are carnivorous or omnivorous. Um, and we also look at shrimp, um, with this project too. So they're also omnivores and require wild caught, um, animals to feed them. Um, but some are, and salmon are increasingly being fed more plant-based foods.

But the problem there is that studies have shown that no matter what their diet is, they're not creating a net amount of protein. So, you know, even if it's soy that's coming from rainforests, where trees have been cut down to produce it or grains, um, you know, we're taking a massive amount of resources and funneling them through fish, which are actually, um, way less efficient than if you were eating, you know, plant-based options and sometimes even less efficient than other animal-based proteins.

Mariann Sullivan: Yeah, so that's, I mean, that's very similar though to the problems of factory farming of land animals that, that they, they have to eat even, even though they're not eating other animals, uh, as so many of the fish are, uh, even when they're eating plants, they're, they're vastly reducing the amount of, uh, nutrition that people can get from those plants. So

Jasmin Singer: Yeah,

Mariann Sullivan: did, I had not realized that I, I know very little about what fish eat, but either way it's a problem.

Jasmin Singer: And I wanna take a step back. Uh, and I do wanna get into those myths as well, but I feel like I'm still catching up too, like Mariann is. What is the status of overfishing? Actually, I think all fishing is overfishing, but I digress. Like where are ocean populations? How have fish farms made it worse?

Laura Lee Cascada: Yeah, I agree with you, and it's astronomically worse than it was when fish farming first, um, came about. And so right now only 7% of so-called fisheries are not considered over exploited or fully exploited, which just means. Basically being fully exploited means that it's at the max limit without causing the population to crash.

So to me, that is not a good metric for, for keeping a fish population healthy, of course, but the fact that only 7% are not in that category or worse. Um, and that has been a continuously shrinking number over the last 50 or 60 years while farmed fishing has grown, um, really reveals a lot about how it hasn't fixed the problem.

Mariann Sullivan: So, uh, I just, before we go on, I just wanted to go back a second and, and reaffirm what you said about people didn't used to eat a lot of salmon. I mean, I remember people didn't used to eat a lot of fish. I mean, and I was Catholic, so we ate fish on Friday and it was just total punishment like fish... the different perception of, of, of fish as a very common food really, really is true. Salmon, you know, occasionally we would get lox. I, I'm sorry to be speaking about eating animals, but, you know, I grew up eating animals.

Laura Lee Cascada: Yeah, most of us did.

Mariann Sullivan: Was so expensive. You would just put a tiny little piece of lox on your bagel.

Uh, it's so, this is so dramatically changed in the availability and the popularity of, of, of fish. I mean, people, as we said at the beginning, are very, they have a really off perception of what aquaculture is. They, they think it's really virtuous. They think it's really good. Can you talk a little bit about... there's obviously reasons for that, not just that people are making it up, but there's a pretty big gap between what the industry says about what they're doing and what it is doing, right?

Uh, can you just talk to that a little bit?

Laura Lee Cascada: Yeah, so aquaculture was sort of framed as this blue revolution. Um, again, the idea of saving the oceans while still allowing us to eat a lot of fish. Um, and they've used so much marketing to drive that home, and they've also used some really insidious sort of manipulative, uh, behaviors both with consumers and policy makers.

So for example, um, there was a project in the eighties called Project Japan, and that was where the Norwegian seafood industry came into Japan, where in sushi culture they weren't actually using, um, salmon because they thought that this fish was, you know, too risky, um, might have parasites. And they used the marketing campaign to convince Japanese chefs that salmon was safe and trendy and modern, and they used all kinds of advertising and events, and they did so right as sushi was becoming this big worldwide phenomenon. So they really, this was really calculated and they basically got salmon included into sushi culture. And then as it spread around the world so many people were exposed to salmon who hadn't been eating salmon.

So it was like things like that where they were going in and really know what, knowing what they were doing and convincing people of the safety and environmental sustainability of, um, these products that just, that doesn't exist.

Jasmin Singer: Yeah, no kidding. I, I mean, there's so many misperceptions out there. Uh, I, I also grew up eating animals, but not fish only because long before I made any kind of connection between, you know, the, the land animals that I was consuming and the ethics, I just thought the idea of eating fish was weird and disgusting.

And it was, it was like funny how that sort of entered my reality early on, uh, so I've never really eaten it. Let's take, let's talk about the welfare of fish and other sea life. I'm getting the feeling that it's, it's pretty bad. How bad is it?

Laura Lee Cascada: Yeah, I mean, they are kept in essentially factory farming conditions. So salmon, for example, are kept in these, um, pens in the water. They're called open net pens, um, sometimes on land as well, but essentially millions or hundreds of thousands are put into these pens. They have very little room. Um, they often, if you check out the footage, which, um, is, is really disturbing, but they often are swimming around with deformities and injuries and commonly sea lice, um, which infects them.

And because the water quality is so poor because they're swimming around there with their own waste, um, they often develop diseases that can cause, um, I don't wanna get too graphic, but just a lot of organ problems and pain and suffering. Um, and the mortality is so high on these farms, it can be upwards of 15 or 20%.

So again, the huge loss of life and also just the wastefulness of this industry. Um, it's, it's really terrible. And one other thing that often isn't noticed that I saw coming out in the news the other week is that they use cleaner fish to, these are smaller fish, um, who are used to clean the sea lice off the salmon and the mortality on these guys is also really huge.

There's hundreds of thousands of them dying every year with basically no one knowing about them.

Mariann Sullivan: Wow. It's just every, everything you hear is bad and then you always hear more and it's worse. Every single topic in this area. We, I mean, we obviously focus on the welfare of the animals, but uh, just as obviously a lot of other people focus on the other issues involved in, in, in raising any kind of food.

And so, um, which would include obviously environmental. But before we get to environmental, which I know those implications are huge and I assume a big part of your marketing, what about the human health implications? What is it? Like, can these diseases spread? Uh, are, are there human health implications involved other than just, you know, the fact that eating animals isn't good for you?

Laura Lee Cascada: Yeah, there are a number, and I think it's a really great point about welfare versus sustainability versus human health. And I think especially in this industry, it's all so tied together because all of the conditions that make welfare so poor, are also things that cause havoc on the environment and human health.

When it comes to human health, the main problem is the antibiotics that are needed to deal with the rampant disease on these farms, and we're seeing a huge antimicrobial resistance problem across the world.

That is definitely, uh, furthered by this industry. So we are seeing that you can go and test, uh, shrimp or other fish, um, on grocery store shelves and still see remnants of antibiotics. And often these are illegal antibiotics in the US. So the overuse of antibiotics is really concerning for humans, along with the diseases. They can be passed to other fish in the water. They can be on fish still when you buy the products at the store. Um, and the, just the contaminants and the filth that they're raised in, it's just all basically a big mess.

Jasmin Singer: Hmm. What about the environmental implications? I think that unfortunately because it's hard enough to get people to care about land animals, uh, and they tend to care about those who are most like them, it probably is harder to get them to care about fish. People pretend that they care about the environment.

So are there, like, what are the arguments there that you can tell someone?

Laura Lee Cascada: Yeah. So the diseases that they have do spew out into the surrounding environment. Um, so other ocean animals are, are at risk and there have actually been studies showing that a lot of the bacteria surrounding these sites are, uh, antibiotic resistant, meaning that if animals or people pick them up, then they're less likely to be treatable.

So it really does cascade throughout, um, the environment and to people, and this is all because these are open net pens in the ocean. They're basically treating these pens like their own private property, when really they're like in our public area for everybody to enjoy.

Mariann Sullivan: So in land-based agriculture currently, I mean obviously there's a, a, a big move to get people to go vegan or at least to eat less meat. But there's a lot of effort going into making factory farming not as bad. Uh, like cage-free campaigns, crate free campaigns. Are there ways to, to, to improve the conditions within fish farming? Are companies trying to do that, or at least saying they're doing that? Or is it just awful and there's no way to fix that and we're just gonna ignore that. Like, is that part of the campaign to improve the conditions in fish farming?

Laura Lee Cascada: That's not something we're working on. I know that a lot of people are, and I think it's, um, you know, a really great endeavor to try to improve the welfare of animals who are already kind of doomed in this system. Um, but we kind of see it as all of these farms are factory farms. So even if you improve the conditions a little bit, um, the amount of harm done is still so great that people need to know, you know, what it is they're buying.

And there's a huge problem with greenwashing labels now where they, you know, slap them on the package and say that this was responsibly farmed. I saw that in the store the other day. So people don't know what that means. And if they make one little tweak or you know, do a couple of things and then have one of these labels, people think, oh, this is like a perfect product.

And it's the same with land animal products. And so we really wanna raise the alarm on these and hope that people, you know, don't get tricked by these.

Mariann Sullivan: Yeah, like what kind of improvements would there be? Like, would it be more space? Like, like fewer? Not as densely packed? Like I don't even understand how you would improve the conditions.

Laura Lee Cascada: There are some changes like that. Trying to reduce the stocking density, although it's difficult because that means, um. know, the companies will profit less, but that would give fish more room,

Mariann Sullivan: problem.

Laura Lee Cascada: Right? Um, and then, you know, providing less cruel, stunning and slaughter for them, um,

Mariann Sullivan: Slaughter. Yeah.

Laura Lee Cascada: Providing, um, you know, more enrichment things for them to do, although it's really hard to, to do things when you're really stressed out, um, and suffering. So there are some changes and I think a lot of the certifications really focus more on environmental changes as well,

Mariann Sullivan: Yeah.

Laura Lee Cascada: which we've. Also found are really insufficient.

Like some of these certifications, you know, claim that they're responsible and sustainable, but when it comes down to it, they're still allowing antibiotics. They're still allowing extremely high volumes of fish packed into small areas. They're not doing anything about water quality. Um, they have no limits for mortality.

So there's really small changes being made, but I think for the average person who doesn't wanna be contributing to this, they would be surprised at how small those changes really are.

Jasmin Singer: I know that microplastics are having a real moment, like finally kind of getting into the mainstream. Uh,

Mariann Sullivan: to speak.

Jasmin Singer: well, Yeah.

No shit.

Mariann Sullivan: Yeah,

Jasmin Singer: Are, are, are people like drawing the connection between what's in our seas as far as microplastics and fishes and, and like are there any connections there that you're able to speak to?

I'm going kind of, I'm going rogue here. I wasn't planning on asking about this, but I did just see like on some mainstream news, there was like this massive story about it and I feel like I'm seeing it everywhere. Is there a connection here?

Laura Lee Cascada: Yeah, so there, there's definitely some concern about the nets used in these farms, um, contributing to microplastics. And then I've also read about how shrimp as a seafood, I hate calling it that, but shrimp are the highest in microplastics of any other type of sea animal eaten. Um, so, and most of shrimp are farmed, so about 90% of the shrimp, um, that people eat are farmed.

So, yeah, it's definitely a concern. I think microplastics are everywhere. And of course, raising these animals in the sea and in bodies of water, um, using plastic materials or even the plastics already in those bodies of water, getting into those animals' bodies, um, it's a, yeah, a recipe for disaster.

Jasmin Singer: Yeah.

Mariann Sullivan: Yeah, and I, it just seems like microplastics is something that people hear, like it creeps them out. I don't know. That's my, that's my estimate. I'm always astounded when people seem to care about anything. Um. Uh, you know, our audience is by and large, you know, this is for information mostly 'cause they're already not eating sea animals.

I'm trying to call them sea animals and not seafood. I'm working on that really hard. Um, so what would be your advice to people who, who, you know, would like to have some basic information, uh, that they can convey to people who, you know, sometimes people are actually about the situation that's going on with the food they're eating. What, what would be your best, like maybe three talking points to, to make an impact on people from your experience talking about these issues?

What points do you suggest other people use when they only have a few minutes, they only have an elevator speech to, to, to convey what's wrong with fish farming?

Laura Lee Cascada: I think the aquaculture industry has sold fish farming as a lifeline for oceans, and it's, instead it's delivered factory farms that devour wild fish, bring diseases to people and to other animals, and pollute our coasts. And aquaculture also promised to fix overfishing, but in reality, fish populations have plummeted for decades, and now we're seeing more than 90% of so-called fisheries being fully or over exploited, meaning they're at the brink.

Aquaculture hasn't done anything to fix this problem and has only made it worse. And the best thing that people can do to help with this problem is really to cut back on eating sea animals, or eat no sea animals at all, and to be aware of greenwashing labels. They can share this with their friends and family, and next time they're at the grocery store and they see labels like responsibly farmed or sustainable, they'll know that that, you know, really isn't what it seems.

Jasmin Singer: I wanna go back to what you said at the beginning of our interview, which was the five myths. Can we go back to that? What are they the five myths of, and can you, can you get into it?

Mariann Sullivan: And I think we only got to two. Did we? Because I interrupted you.

Laura Lee Cascada: Yeah, no problem. It's a lot. And our whole project is dedicated to exposing these and to, you know, helping people understand them. But, um, basically the first one is about, um, aquaculture saying that it's the solution to overfishing. So these are all myths that the industry is promoting. Um, the second myth, which we kind of got into, is about aquaculture providing this seafood for this rising demand across the world. Um, and we talked a little bit about this, but basically aquaculture is sort of creating that demand through its misleading marketing, through pushing, uh, policymakers to allow it to grow infinitely. And in reality, people wouldn't be needing so much seafood and it's really driving this demand in the global north, like in the US where we're already eating so much, we have no need to eat anymore.

Um, the rest of the miss, we kind of did go through a lot of it. Um, one is about, um, it being a safe and uh, healthy protein, which we talked about being not true. And then the fourth one is around climate.

A lot of people change their diet because of climate change, and sometimes that ends up being, you know, removing beef and replacing beef with seafood. So when you look at the numbers though, farmed fish is actually worse than chicken, and about the same as pork in terms of emissions, and farmed shrimp is way worse.

It's the worst out of all sea animal foods. And lastly, is regarding the labels, which I talked about a little bit, the certifications seeming to be this guarantee of sustainability and health, when in reality they're often tied to industry. The industry pays them to be certified. So that kind of creates a conflict of interest, and there's really very little accountability for the certifications.

Often they're not visiting every farm, so they don't even know, you know, what's, what's going on behind the scenes.

Jasmin Singer: Hmm.

Mariann Sullivan: So I noticed that you're working with Farm Forward is, is that a formal collaboration? Uh, how, how, linked to them, are you? I guess they don't really cover sea animals.

Laura Lee Cascada: Yeah, so we're working with them a lot in terms of, um, you know, leveraging their expertise. They have a extensive experience in humane washing, um, and looking at how different labels for the land animal farming industry have really tricked consumers into thinking that, you know, they're buying eggs from happy hens and beef from, you know, free roaming cows.

And so they've, they've had so much experience with this. They've, you know, exposed, for example, antibiotics in antibiotic free meat at Whole Foods. It was supposed to be antibiotic free. And just showing people that, you know, what they think they're paying for is not the reality. So in teaming up with Farm Forward, that really leverages their expertise and we're working really closely with them, um, to help get this new sort of industry... well, it's not a new industry, but you know, new to people, I think, thinking about it in this way, um, to get more exposure on this.

Mariann Sullivan: You know, it's so, there are such differences in the land animal area because, you know, Farm Forward states that it's anti-factory farming. And to be anti factory farming in the land animal area basically means that you have to drastically reduce your, your consumption or stop your consumption because to treat animals well costs a lot of money and, it just doesn't work.

So it's kind of inherent in being anti factory farming to also be saying that you should reduce. But it seems like it's a little different in with fish because there's this alternative source of wild caught that, that people who really don't know a lot or don't care about the environment could just go back to.

Do you find that like a, a contrast in how you, in, in how you talk about the solution that the solution has to include cutting down or hopefully cutting out? Was that question unclear?

Laura Lee Cascada: Yeah, yeah, yeah. That gets tricky because I think that is kind of like a gut reaction that a lot of people have is if farmed fish is so bad, why shouldn't I just go back to eating wild fish?

Mariann Sullivan: We truly are just talking about just one bad day with wild caught fish.

Laura Lee Cascada: In the bigger picture though, I think when we look at just the massive scale, so farmed fish is making up a little more than half of what people eat now, and then wild caught has kind of gone to second place. Um, but scale wise, first of all, we can't sustain this scale, this, these kinds of numbers, um, because neither one of those two industries can keep functioning at the level they are. So we have to reduce overall.

In the US most fish is farmed, so it's obvious that we have to reduce, you know, and that includes farmed fish. But the reason we can't just go back to wild fish is because they're already at the brink. These fisheries are at the brink and um, they keep getting worse every year. So we have to reduce pressure on them as well. And of course, with wild fish, a lot of the problems of, you know, toxic chemicals like mercury, um, exposure to bacteria and antibiotics from, you know, passing through these farms or from wastewater.

Um, a lot of these problems still persist in wild fish. And then of course the, the welfare problems, um, and the extremely inhumane, uh, conditions that they're subjected to in these nets, and then being thrown overboard and then, you know, slaughtered. And, um, it's all just horrific. So we're really advocating for an overall reduction or, you know, elimination if you can.

Mariann Sullivan: No, I know you are. And, and those are really good arguments, but it is a tricky, it is a little trickier than, uh, than, then the land animal thing where you kind of just don't have to eat. Like if, if people are eating a high welfare in, in animals, it's fairly expensive. If it's not really expensive, it's definitely not quote unquote high welfare.

Anyway.

Jasmin Singer: We obviously also are, you know, giant proponents of not living a life that is centered around exploitation of animals in any capacity. What are your thoughts, either personally or as an advocate, about the word vegan?

Laura Lee Cascada: Yeah, I mean, I personally use the word vegan. Um, you know, and I have no problems with it. I think that it's a great way to, you know, identify living a life without, um, consuming animal products. We, you know, it depends on the audiences we're talking with because, you know, some of the decision makers that we're going to, um, and presenting these ideas to might unfortunately not, um, resonate with the word vegan.

Um, so we talk a lot about reduction, um, and, you know, eating more plant-based foods and the decision makers we're talking with often are serving foods in large, you know, cafeterias. And so we want them to see, you know, plant-based foods are great, a lot of people are eating vegan. Um, you know, it's more inclusive for your menu.

There's, you know, allergens you can avoid. It's more climate friendly. So we might not always use the word vegan when we're talking with certain people, but yeah, I, I use it myself for sure.

Mariann Sullivan: I, I wanna get into more of, of your work in both, you know, individual messaging, but, but it looks like you're focusing a on on institutional providers.

But there was another issue I wanted to get into first, and I just think this is a really interesting issue. And I'm wondering, since you are dealing both with salmon and shrimp, or your main uh, are your main focus, I think for the moment, 'cause there's a lot of animals, sea animals out there. Um, like do you differentiate, like when you're talking about welfare, do you differentiate between fish and shrimp? Or I guess it could even come to clams or oysters. Animals whose sentience is really not clear to people. It's really not necessarily clear to even scientists. Uh, uh, when you're, you, you keep reaching to a further level. Do you talk about levels of sentience or, or sophistication of sentience, or is it just like with, since you're only dealing with shrimp, but you know, imagine you're dealing with others as well, is it just like they're sentient or they're not, and, and you feel you can convince people of that? Or do you just avoid the issue completely?

I'm just, I'm always so curious now that we've discovered that everybody out there is sentient, I think our, our, our messaging on the issue has become much, so much more complex. I'm just wondering how you handle it.

Laura Lee Cascada: Yeah, that's a really good question. You know, we don't talk a lot about it with decision makers who are, you know, concerned about their menus and all of that. But for me personally in my work, I've always had a huge affinity for crustaceans and been keenly aware of their ability to suffer. Uh, several years back, I guess it's been about 10 years or so now, but I founded a project to help hermit crabs who were being, or still are, being caught from the Caribbean and sold on the beach, um, here in the US at shops during the summer. And it's a really cruel industry because they're taking these animals who can live for 30 years out in the wild and putting them into tiny cages where tourists will take them home and then they basically die of suffocation over the course of a few months because the air isn't humid enough and they require very specific conditions.

So for me, crustacean welfare has always been a huge concern of mine. I have a particular love for crustaceans and I think, you know, science has shown us like they can rub wounds when they're hurt. Um, they can form bonds, they can work together. So I think, you know, the sentience pretty clear and we need to be able to recognize that for all sea animals.

Mariann Sullivan: I mean, I'm sure there's still people who think that fish like the salmon aren't sentient at all. Like do you run into that a lot or do you just avoid it? Or, like, it's

Laura Lee Cascada: Yeah.

Mariann Sullivan: bizarre to me that people still think that fish, like, I don't know, they think they're like vegetables or something.

They're just wandering around, like completely unconscious or something. Uh, do, do you push it or do you just focus on when you, when you run into obstacles on, on those or just focus on the environmental? You have so many different issues you could turn to, uh,

Laura Lee Cascada: Yeah, I think we're, we're realizing that too more as we get into this and we are now purposely emphasizing the term sea animals. I know you said something about that earlier because we wanna make sure that they are being seen as animals and we're not reinforcing the idea that they're just seafood.

So, it's taking some language adjusting because when you're hearing people say seafood over and over again and not thinking of them as animals, we do wanna subtly like not reinforce that and really drive home that they are animals just in, you know, small ways so that it can open their minds up to, you know, slowly changing and seeing things differently.

So, for sure, and the other thing is, when we talk about the diseases that these fish suffer from, we definitely emphasize the suffering that they go through with those diseases or with those injuries that they receive. So we don't, know, we don't kind of hide those details. We want people to realize that there is suffering there.

Mariann Sullivan: Yeah,

Jasmin Singer: So before we close, uh, and I am interested in chatting with you further for our flock bonus content. But before we do that, I'd love to know a little bit more specifically about your outreach efforts. Like who are you talking to? I'm assuming it's not generally Our Hen House listeners that's your main audience, but we're the allies.

And what is your ask, especially on an institutional level?

Laura Lee Cascada: Yeah, so our main audiences right now are environmental leaders because, you know, I think fish has been pushed as this eco-friendly solution for so long that a lot of environmental organizations and professionals have embraced, uh, aquaculture as a sort of solution. And so we're talking with them. We really wanna see the environmental movement move away from all animal products and toward plant-based eating.

And we're also working on universities and really anywhere that serves food. I think events are a really good place for starting out because conferences can easily, you know, make a decision for their conference that then sort of sets a precedent for years to come.

So our basic kind of asks for them are to reduce the animals, um, that they're serving and prioritize more plant-based options. Definitely keep shrimp and salmon, farmed shrimp and salmon, off the menu and then to not be pulled into these greenwashing labels. So we've seen a lot of places that have committed to using, um, labels or guides like Seafood Watch, none of which really ensure uh, sustainability or welfare, or human health for that matter. So we want them to just be aware of those and to not fall for, you know, using them as a commitment to signal sustainability when that's not really the case.

Jasmin Singer: Hmm.

Mariann Sullivan: And, and just to clarify, you, you, you are not in the business of recommending quote unquote high welfare, um, sources of fish.

Laura Lee Cascada: Nope, Nope. We're fully promoting reducing, drastically reducing the amount of fish, um, that is being served across the US.

Mariann Sullivan: Okay.

Jasmin Singer: So tell our listeners how they can find out more about the Aquaculture Accountability Project and get involved with your efforts.

Laura Lee Cascada: Yeah, so you can find us, it's a long URL, but you can find us at aquacultureaccountability.org. Uh, you can shoot me an email from there. Um, there's an easy contact form there. We have social media to Aquaculture Accountability is our handle for the most part 'cause it's a little shorter than the whole name.

Um, and yeah, we would love, especially students, I think that's a really, um, great opportunity. For example, we've talked with some students who have already run their own campaign at Scripps College in California and gotten their dining hall to agree to remove shrimp from the menu.

I think students have a really, you know, great position to advocate for these kinds of changes, but even if you're not a student, even if you're just, you know, someone in your community who wants to make a difference, we'd love to talk with you.

Jasmin Singer: Hmm. I love that. Thank you. So much for all that you're doing. Um, I, I want to dig a little bit more into some of the reasons that you were called to do this work, but we'll save that for bonus content. But, and also just for our listeners, we will link to the website and the socials as well on our show notes. So Laura Lee Cascada, thank you for joining us today on Our Hen House.

And for those of you listening, thank you for tuning in. Don't forget to subscribe, hit like, comment on your favorite pod catcher or on YouTube. And don't forget that our next episode of Rising Anxieties comes out on Tuesday. So until next time, we'll talk to you soon.