Wild fish (Vilde fisk)
The demand for wild fish in European Union is larger than the regional sea’s supply capacity and the Danish and European fishery is embraced by quota (Ministeriet for Fødevarer, Landbrug og Fiskeri, 2002) to limit fishery. Hence, the extent of Danish fishery is independent of demand and environmental impacts associated with fish whether they are fresh or processed are determined by the products, which they substitute rather than the processes associated with catching and processing.
It is unknown what kinds of food are most likely to substitute specific wild fish and until more knowledge becomes available any food product such as chicken, pork, cattle, farmed fish, vegetables or bread can be appropriate. Thus, the potential environmental impacts associated with a demand for wild fish (codfish, flatfish, herring, mackerel, lobster, shrimp and mussels) equals the environmental impacts associated with for instance some of the following products.
| Possible substitutes for wild fish |
|
Pork (tenderloin, ham, steaky bacon, minced meat etc.) Cattle (tenderloin, fillet, steak, knuckle shank, round, minced meat etc.) |
The environmental impact associated with wild fish demand would be determined by fishing processes and processing in fish industry if the quota regime was removed from fishing and the extent of fishery was determined by the market. The figure below shows the main processes influenced by a demand for fish exemplified with cod fish in an envisioned scenario that market regulates the extent of fishery.
 |
| figur 1: Market based product chain diagram for cod fishery covering the most important processes in terms of contribution to global warming, in an envisioned scenario that the extent of cod fishery is regulated by market demand. Boxes refer to production processes. Names of grey boxes refer to the main product of the processes. Red arrows represent material or energy transfer between two processes; green arrows represent saved material or energy transfer as a result of displacements; green lines represent displacements and red lines represent avoided displacements. Further details can be found in the LCA model. |
Cod fishery is the most important process in terms of codfish catch and it assumed that the extent of cod fishery will be changed if the market demand for cod fish changes. A variety of other fish (herring, flatfish, mackerel etc.) are caught as side catch during cod fishery and the environmental impacts associated exclusively with codfish have been determined by system expansion. The other categories of fishery (herring fishery, flatfish fishery, and mackerel fishery) have side catches as well and the environmental exchanges associated with these "secondary side catches" have also been eliminated by system expansion, explaining the large number of red and green lines in the figure. Se also Thrane (2003).
The
table below show
the
potential
environmental impacts
associated with
fish demand
ex harbor, ex fish industry and ex retail store in an envisioned scenario
that the fishing quota regime is released. Data are provided per kg of
fresh fish (entire animal) or fish product.
Cod fish
|
Impact category
|
Unit | Fresh cod fish | Fresh codfish fillet |
Frozen cod fillet |
|||
|
Ex harbor |
Ex retail |
Ex fillet factory |
Ex retail |
Ex fillet factory |
Ex retail |
||
|
Global warming |
g CO2-eq. |
1200 |
1200 | 2700 | 2800 | 2800 |
3200 |
|
Acidification |
g SO2-eq. |
14 |
15 | 31 | 32 | 31 |
32 |
| Nutrient enrichment | g NO3-eq. | 24 | 25 | 55 | 55 | 55 | 56 |
| Photochemical smog | g ethene eq. | 1.7 | 1.8 | 3.8 | 3.9 | 3.8 | 4.0 |
| Land use | m2 year | not relevant | not relevant | -1.1 | -1.1 | -1.1 | -1.1 |
| Location in database: Material/Food from primary sectors/Fishery/ or Material/Food from supermarket/Cooling counter/ or Material/Food from supermarket/Freezing counter/ or Material/Food from industery/Food from fish industry/ |
Flat fish
|
Impact category
|
Unit | Fresh flat fish | Fresh flatfish fillet |
Frozen flatfish fillet |
|||
|
Ex harbor |
Ex retail |
Ex fillet factory |
Ex retail |
Ex fillet factory |
Ex retail |
||
|
Global warming |
g CO2-eq. |
3300 |
3300 | 7400 | 7400 | 7500 |
7800 |
|
Acidification |
g SO2-eq. |
40 |
40 | 88 | 88 | 88 |
89 |
| Nutrient enrichment | g NO3-eq. | 68 | 69 | 152 | 153 | 152 | 154 |
| Photochemical smog | g ethene eq. | 4.8 | 4.9 | 11 | 11 | 11 | 11 |
| Land use | m2 year | not relevant | not relevant | -1.1 | -1.1 | -1.1 | -1.1 |
| Location in database: Material/Food from primary sectors/Fishery/ or Material/Food from supermarket/Cooling counter/ or Material/Food from supermarket/Freezing counter/ or Material/Food from industery/Food from fish industry/ |
Herring
|
Impact category
|
Unit |
Fresh
herring |
Fresh herring fillet |
Frozen herring fillet |
|||
|
Ex harbor |
Ex
retail |
Ex
fillet factory |
Ex
retail |
Ex fillet factory |
Ex retail |
||
|
Global warming |
g CO2-eq. |
580 |
630 |
1300 | 1300 | 1400 |
1800 |
|
Acidification |
g SO2-eq. |
7.1 |
7.4 |
14 |
14 |
14 |
15 |
| Nutrient enrichment | g NO3-eq. | 12 | 13 | 25 | 25 | 25 | 26 |
| Photochemical smog | g ethene eq. | 0.86 | 0.95 | 1.8 | 1.8 | 1.8 | 1.9 |
| Land use | m2 year | not relevant | not relevant | -0.72 | -0.72 | -0.72 | -0.72 |
| Location in database: Material/Food from primary sectors/Fishery/ or Material/Food from supermarket/Cooling counter/ or Material/Food from supermarket/Freezing counter/ or Material/Food from industery/Food from fish industry/ |
Mackerel
|
Impact category
|
Unit |
Fresh
mackerel |
Fresh mackerel fillet |
Frozen mackerel fillet |
|||
|
Ex harbor |
Ex
retail |
Ex
fillet factory |
Ex
retail |
Ex fillet factory |
Ex retail |
||
|
Global warming |
g CO2-eq. | 170 |
220 |
460 | 510 | 620 |
960 |
|
Acidification |
g SO2-eq. | 2.1 |
2.4 |
4.1 |
4.4 | 4.2 |
4.9 |
| Nutrient enrichment | g NO3-eq. | 3.6 | 4.1 | 7.6 | 8.2 | 7.9 | 9.1 |
| Photochemical smog | g ethene eq. | 0.25 | 0.34 | 0.54 | 0.63 | 0.55 | 0.68 |
| Land use | m2 year | not relevant | not relevant | -0.72 | -0.72 | -0.72 | -0.72 |
| Location in database: Material/Food from primary sectors/Fishery/ or Material/Food from supermarket/Cooling counter/ or Material/Food from supermarket/Freezing counter/ or Material/Food from industery/Food from fish industry/ |
Industrial fish
| Impact category | Unit | Ex harbor |
|
Global warming |
g CO2-eq. | 220 |
|
Acidification |
g SO2-eq. | 2.6 |
| Nutrient enrichment | g NO3-eq. | 4.5 |
| Photochemical smog | g ethene eq. | 0.32 |
| Land use | m2 year | not relevant |
| Location in database: Material/Food from primary sectors/Fishery/ |
Lobster
| Impact category | Unit |
Fresh lobster |
|
|
Ex harbor |
Ex retail |
||
|
Global warming |
g CO2-eq. |
20200 |
20200 |
|
Acidification |
g SO2-eq. |
250 |
250 |
| Nutrient enrichment | g NO3-eq. | 420 | 420 |
| Photochemical smog | g ethene eq. | 30 | 30 |
| Land use | m2 year | not relevant | not relevant |
Shrimp
|
Impact category
|
Unit | Fresh shrimp |
Peeled and frozen shrimp |
||
|
Ex harbor |
Ex retail |
Ex factory |
Ex retail |
||
|
Global warming |
g CO2-eq. |
2940 |
3000 |
1010 |
10500 |
|
Acidification |
g SO2-eq. |
38 |
38 |
115 |
120 |
| Nutrient enrichment | g NO3-eq. | 65 | 65 | 197 | 198 |
| Photochemical smog | g ethene eq. | 4.5 | 4.6 | 14 | 14 |
| Land use | m2 year | not relevant | not relevant | -1.7 | -1.7 |
| Location in database: Material/Food from primary sectors/Fishery/ or Material/Food from supermarket/Cooling counter/ or Material/Food from supermarket/Freezing counter/ or Material/Food from industery/Food from fish industry/ |
Mussels
|
Impact
category
|
Unit |
Fresh mussels | |
|
Ex harbor |
Ex retail |
||
|
Global warming |
g CO2-eq. |
40 |
90 |
|
Acidification |
g SO2-eq. |
0.48 |
0.82 |
| Nutrient enrichment | g NO3-eq. | 0.83 | 1.4 |
| Photochemical smog | g ethene eq. | 0.058 | 0.15 |
| Land use | m2 year | not relevant | not relevant |
|
Location in database: Material/Food from primary sectors/Fishery/ or Material/Food from supermarket/Cooling counter/ |
References
Ministeriet for Fødevarer, Landbrug og Fiskeri (2002). Kvoter 2003. In Danish.pdf.
Thrane M. (2003). Environmental impacts from Danish fish products. Ph.D. dissertation, Aalborg University (Denmark). Department of Development and Planning. In preparation.