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Assessing Environmental Impacts of Sea Bass Cage Farms in Greece and Albania Using Life Cycle Assessment

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Abstract

Life-cycle assessment (LCA) is increasingly used in aquaculture studies to quantitatively assess materials, energy flows and impacts of a production system and to evaluate the environmental performance of products and services. The application of LCA to sea bass production in two marine farms located in Greece and Albania demonstrated that feed and accordingly feed conversion ratio, followed by fry were the two predominant factors mostly affecting the eighteen ecological impact categories assessed. In particular, for the Greek farm, feed affected all but one of the impact categories from 76.5 to 99.9%, reflecting the relation of fish feed not only to resource use, but also to impacts during processing, transportation and to its distribution to the farmed stocks. The role of feed was also reflected on its share (90.6%) in the ‘global warming’ indicator. Fry production resulted in a major contribution (99.0%) to the ‘water consumption’ impact category, which is related to the hatchery operation. Concerning the Albanian farm, the impact of fish feed was even more pronounced in most of the ecological indicators, due to the absence of motorised equipment. It is concluded that feeding management and initiatives to improve the cost and the environmental impact in both counties could result in immediate improvements of the ecological and economical outcomes of the mariculture industry in the region. Further benefits are also expected for the ecological sustainability and economic viability of the sector, as consumers are exhibiting interest in environmental awareness and eco-labelling.

Article Highlights

  • Aquaculture is a rapidly growing sector of the economy in Europe and Globally. Greece and Albania are two neighbouring countries which can compete for marine resources required for marine aquaculture development. As a result of an international research collaboration on a project funded by the European Union, we carried out research about the environmental impact of marine aquaculture in Albania and Greece. The results of this work are presented in the submitted manuscript which is the first, which presents the results of LCA for assessing the environmental impacts of sea bass cage farms in Greece and Albania.

  • The paper’s primary contribution is to address the issue of environmental impact of the aquaculture sector in the cross-border line of Albania and Greece. International collaboration is required to reduce the emissions caused by sea bass aquaculture and elucidate the parameters which can contribute to reduce the environmental impacts and footprint of aquaculture.

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Acknowledgements

This work was part of the research project entitled ‘Ecological footprint in cross-border marine fish farming in Sagiada (Greece) and southern Albania’ (‘ECO-FISH’), which was funded by the Interreg IPA II Cross-Border Cooperation Programme Greece-Albania 2014–2020. The authors would like to thank Ioannis Hekimoglou and Thanasis Vasiliadis for their valuable assistance during the field trip in Albania.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Fisheries, Regional Unit of Thesprotia, Epirus, GR 46100, Igoumenitsa, Greece

    Evangelos Konstantinidis & Costas Perdikaris

  2. Department of Agriculture, School of Agriculture, University of Ioannina, GR 47100, Arta, Greece

    Evangelia Gouva, Cosmas Nathanalides, Athina Tzora & Ioannis Skoufos

  3. Department of Natural Resources Management and Agricultural Engineering, Agricultural University of Athens, Iera Odos 75, GR-11855, Athens, Greece

    Thomas Bartzanas & Vasileios Anestis

  4. Centre for Research and Technology Hellas, Institute for Bio-Economy and Agri-Technology, Dimarchou Georgiadou, GR-38333, Volos, Greece

    Thomas Bartzanas & Vasileios Anestis

  5. Social Education and Environmental Protection, Vlorë, Albania

    Simo Ribaj

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  1. Evangelos Konstantinidis
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  2. Costas Perdikaris
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  4. Cosmas Nathanalides
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Correspondence to Cosmas Nathanalides.

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Konstantinidis, E., Perdikaris, C., Gouva, E. et al. Assessing Environmental Impacts of Sea Bass Cage Farms in Greece and Albania Using Life Cycle Assessment. Int J Environ Res 14, 693–704 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s41742-020-00289-8

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