Aquaculture production in the EU

On March 25, 2025, the launch of the awareness campaign Aquaculture in the European Union: with a passion for you took place in Brussels, with the aim of increasing public awareness and understanding of the values that aquaculture brings to the EU, particularly among the 25-45 age group. In this article, we will present the highlights of the launched campaign and write about how aquaculture production in the EU and its importance.

Aquaculture in the EU

The launch of the information campaign Aquaculture in the European Union: with passion for you featured a panel discussion on the importance of aquaculture in the EU. Speakers included EU Commissioner for Maritime Affairs and Fisheries Costas Kadis and national aquaculture ambassadors from Germany, Greece, France and Poland.

In a speech, EU Commissioner for Maritime Affairs and Fisheries Costas Kadis stressed that the EU’s fishing and aquaculture sectors are essential to ensuring a stable and sustainable supply of nutritious food for millions of people. Global demand for seafood continues to grow, and the EU still imports 70 percent of the seafood consumed. Therefore, it is critical for the EU to protect marine ecosystems and secure the future of the fishing industry to meet the needs of EU citizens and consumers.

Commissioner Costas Kadis also recalled that on February 19, 2025. The European Commission published a Vision for Agriculture and Food, which aims to create a thriving, competitive and equitable agri-food sector by 2040. It points out the important role of the fisheries and aquaculture sectors in the food chain. According to Costas Kadis, effective fisheries management and sustainable aquaculture must be key to transforming our food systems. By supporting sustainable fishing practices, we can protect a key source of protein, strengthening the broader EU food supply chain and contributing to the resilience of our food systems in the face of climate change and other global challenges.

The campaign’s launch was also attended by Deputy Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development Jacek Czerniak, who stressed that having a strong aquaculture sector to better meet the needs of the EU should be a real priority for the community, but also for Poland and other member countries that have the potential and resources to develop the industry. A strong aquaculture industry is a kind of building block for the EU’s multidimensional security. In Poland, aquaculture farms are mostly small, family-owned businesses. They bring a sense of local belonging and economic security to workers.

Aquaculture production in the EU

From 1990 to 2020, worldwide aquaculture production increased significantly, while in all member states it remained stable at around 1.2 million tons. In 2020, the value of aquaculture production in the EU was €3.9 billion. By weight, 50 percent of this figure was fish products, and 49 percent was shellfish. EU aquaculture producers focus mainly on four species – mussels (30 percent of the total volume), trout (17 percent), oysters (9 percent) and gourd (8 percent). Other important farmed species in the EU are carp, sea bass and bluefin tuna.

In 2020, the top aquaculture producers among member states were Spain (24 percent), France (21 percent), Greece (11 percent) and Italy (10 percent), which together accounted for about 67 percent of aquaculture production. However, in terms of production volume, France ranked first (22 percent), followed by Spain (15 percent), Greece (15 percent) and Italy (9 percent). Spain, France and Italy were dominated by bivalve mollusks (mussels, oysters and clams), while Greece mainly supplied sea bass and gourd. You can read about global fish and seafood production reaching record levels in 2022 in a previous article: Fish and seafood production at record levels – latest FAO report

Aquaculture production in Poland and its importance

The purpose of aquaculture is to ensure sustainable food production and protect wild populations of aquatic organisms. Production of freshwater fish species in Poland is carried out as part of farming and rearing (aquaculture) in ponds and other technical facilities (e.g., flow-through ponds, ponds with standing water, closed and semi-open facilities, hatchery facilities) and in natural inland surface waters and dammed reservoirs (e.g., lake fishing, river fishing). Fish ponds are fed by surface water owned by the state, so the condition for conducting this type of activity is to obtain a water permit.

Aquaculture activities play an important role in the system of rational management of aquatic environmental resources, especially in the context of protecting biodiversity, preserving the unique natural values of fishing areas, and satisfying the leisure needs of the public. Therefore, a key challenge is to further develop this sector using its historical and cultural dimension, such as through the development of gastronomy, tourism and recreation related to fishing.

The dominant fish species for consumption in domestic aquaculture are carp and rainbow trout. Of great economic importance are fish produced in polycultures with carp, including white and spotted carp, species of carp, white amur, tench, European catfish and pike and zander. Among salmonids, significant quantities of pallid (alpine trout) are recorded.