Learning   Portfolio

            Aquaculture is a new, promising field of agriculture that is seen as a highly effective method of sustainable development. As a lover of seafood myself, I found this section of chapter 10 very interesting. Aquaculture is a market that is growing very rapidly. It is “the newest and fastest growing food production sector” today. (Done) Small scale aquaculture has the potential to sustain the lives of people with a definitive source of protein. It seems as though aquaculture should really be seen as a good thing. It can reduce fishing and population hazards in the wild by having a controlled amount of aquatic life made purely for consumption. However, there are some downsides to aquaculture as it rises in popularity.

 

            One of these problems is the fact that aquaculture contributes to certain bacteria gaining resistance to antibiotics. “Resistant bacteria isolated from both aquaculture and agriculture share the same resistance mechanisms, indicating that aquaculture is contributing to the same resistance issues established by terrestrial agriculture.” (Done) What this means is, aquaculture has the same exact issues with bacteria resistance to antibiotics as agriculture. The real problem here lies in that many of the antibiotics used for animals kept in aquaculture and agriculture are the same kinds of antibiotics humans use. “Of 51 antibiotics commonly used in aquaculture and agriculture, 39 (or 76%) are also of importance in human medicine…” (Done) This built resistance to antibiotics harms people because the antibiotics they use are no longer effective. The growing popularity of aquaculture is majorly adding to this problem.