A comparison of Asian aquaculture products using statistically supported LCA

Abstract

We investigated aquaculture production of Asian tiger shrimp, whiteleg shrimp, giant river prawn, tilapia and pangasius in Bangladesh, China, Thailand and Vietnam using life cycle assessments (LCAs), with the purpose of evaluating the comparative eco-efficiency of producing different aquatic food products. Our starting hypothesis was that different production systems are associated with significantly different environmental impacts, as the production of these aquatic species differs in intensity and management practices. In order to test this hypothesis, we estimated the systems global warming, eutrophication and freshwater ecotoxicity impacts. The contribution to these impacts and the overall dispersions relative to results were propagated using Monte Carlo simulations and dependent sampling.