Description

Fish meal is a commercial product mostly made from fish that are not used for human consumption; fishmeal is generally used to feed farm animals in agricultural setting. Because it is calorically dense and cheap to produce, fishmeal has played a critical role in the growth of factory farms and the number of farm animals it is possible to breed and feed.

Uses:
Prior to 1910, fish meal was primarily used as fertilizer, at least in the UK. Fish meal is primarily used as a protein supplement in compound feed. As of 2010, about 56% of fish meal was used to feed farmed fish, about 20% was used in pig feed, about 12% in poultry feed, and about 12% in other uses, which included fertilizer. The cost of 65% protein fishmeal has varied between around $385 to $554 per ton since 2000, which is about two to three times the price of soybean meal. The rising demand for fish, as people in the developed world turn away from red meat and toward other sources of meat protein, has increased demand for farmed fish, with farmed fish accounting for half the fish consumed worldwide as of 2016. Demand for fish meal has increased accordingly, but harvests are regulated and supply cannot expand. This has led to a trend towards use of other ingredients such as soybean meal, cottonseed meal, leftovers from processing from corn and wheat, legumes, and algae, and an increase in research to find alternatives to fish meal and alternate strategic uses (for instance, in the growth phase, after newborn fish are established).

Properties:
Good quality fish meals contain crude protein levels above 66%, fat content around 8 to 11%, and ash generally below 12%. In some of the tropical developing countries, “fish meal” is sometimes produced after sun-drying and grinding, and can have very high levels of ash and relatively low protein levels.