Today (12th July), along with Eurogroup for Animals, we are urging Spanish seafood company, Nueva Pescanova, to abandon plans to build the world's first octopus farm.

We are calling on the company to immediately stop the project on the grounds that, as well as causing cruelty to octopuses, the farm threats public health, the environment and wildlife, contradicting its own corporate sustainability claims.

Our concerns are highlighted in our new joint report, launched today, called Exposing the environmental risks of octopus farming.

Key concerns

Key issues include:

• Public health risk: The company has failed to ensure the seawater used in the farm is suitable for human consumption, jeopardizing food safety.
• Pollution: Construction and operations threaten to contaminate local water, air, and the nocturnal environment. Discharged waste is likely to worsen already poor water quality within the port due to restricted water circulation.
• Use of natural resources: The farm design relies heavily on fossil fuels and consumes vast quantities of seawater, altering its physical and chemical properties before returning it to the environment. In addition, due to octopuses being carnivorous, they require a protein-rich diet, usually consisting of fishmeal and fish oil. This dependence strains food security and sustainability as it diverts fish from human consumption.
• Threat to biodiversity: The Canary Islands Government is concerned that Nueva Pescanova has not adequately considered the impact on surrounding marine protected areas and wildlife.
• Disregarding cultural and recreational areas: The project fails to address potential impacts on a nearby protected recreational diving site and violates local cultural heritage regulations.
• Uncertain legality: The legality of aquaculture activity at the proposed port location is unclear. The port's designated purpose is shipping and transport, raising concerns about human health risks from potential oil spills and shipping pollution.

Nueva Pescanova claims that it is committed to ‘maintaining biodiversity’, ‘protecting the ecosystem’ and ‘promoting the circular economy’. Yet its own Environmental Impact Assessment for the farm at the Port of Las Palmas, Gran Canaria, was considered insufficient by the Canary Islands Government.

Global campaign continues

Due to the myriad of concerns for octopus welfare, human health and the environment, the proposal to factory farm octopuses is not a model to be replicated elsewhere in the world either.

We launched our report, Octopus Farming: A Recipe for Disaster, in 2021 revealing scientific evidence that octopus farming would be both cruel and environmentally damaging. A year ago, we launched a joint report with Eurogroup for Animals, Uncovering the Horrific Reality of Octopus Farming, in response to Nueva Pescanova’s plans to farm around one million of these animals in an aquatic factory farm annually. 

On World Octopus Day (8th October) last year, we joined forces with 75 NGOs, experts, and public figures worldwide to urge the Canary Islands government to reject the plans.

Environmentally unsustainable

Dr Elena Lara, our Senior Research Manager, said: “In the face of climate warnings urging a radical transformation of our food systems, this new form of factory farming is simply unjustifiable.

“The proposed octopus farm would be a disaster on multiple fronts. Not only would it inflict cruelty on these intelligent, solitary creatures but it would be environmentally unsustainable”.

Take action

Show your support by sharing our posts on social media and tagging Nueva Pescanova urging them to immediately stop their plans to build the octopus farm

We should be ending factory farming rather than finding new species to confine. Help to END.IT by signing our petition.