The Case for Keeping Our World-Unique Ban

Comment by Andi Cockroft, Chairman CORANZ

An evidence-based analysis of why New Zealand should resist calls to commercialise trout farming

New Zealand stands alone among the world’s nations in maintaining a complete ban on commercial trout farming. While some see this as an opportunity lost, the evidence overwhelmingly suggests this ban represents one of our smartest conservation and economic decisions. As pressure mounts from commercial interests to overturn this prohibition, it’s crucial we examine the facts behind what would be an environmental and economic catastrophe in the making.

The Unique Status Quo: World’s Only Trout Farming Ban

Since 1973, New Zealand has prohibited commercial trout farming while allowing salmon aquaculture. This makes us probably the only country in the world where trout farming is illegal, despite commercial interest from companies already farming salmon. This decision wasn’t made in haste – it came after careful consideration of the risks posed to our pristine wild fisheries by recreational fishers who understood the stakes involved.

The current push to overturn this ban comes primarily from former salmon farmer Clive Barker, who has been petitioning Parliament since 2018. His “Trout New Zealand” initiative claims potential economic benefits, but the numbers tell a very different story.

The Economics Don’t Add Up

Modest Projections vs Massive Existing Value

Proponents conservatively estimate trout farming could add up to $48 million to New Zealand’s GDP by 2030. In the context of our $400+ billion economy, this represents a drop in the ocean. More importantly, it pales in comparison to what we already have.

New Zealand’s recreational trout fishery conservatively earns at least one billion dollars annually for the national economy. The Taupo trout fishery alone generates $93 million per annum in licence income for DOC and Ngāti Tūwharetoa, while providing social, recreational, and health benefits for thousands of anglers every year.

This isn’t just about direct licence sales. The economic multiplier effect includes:

• International tourism from wealthy fly fishing enthusiasts
• Accommodation and hospitality throughout trout fishing regions
• Equipment manufacturing and retail
• Transport and guiding services
• Regional economic development in rural communities

Capital Intensive, High Risk, Poor Returns

The harsh economic reality is that trout farming requires massive upfront investment with poor returns. The high capital cost of establishing infrastructure – pipes, pumps, filters, tanks, refrigeration, treatment, monitoring and control systems – pushes return on investment out decades.

Tony Orman, who led the 1972 trout anglers’ lobby, noted that scientific evidence from overseas warned that trout farming was “capital intensive, high risk and of doubtful marginal economics.” Nearly 50 years later, nothing has changed in this assessment.

Product Quality: A Poor Substitute

One of the strongest arguments against trout farming lies in the inferior quality of farmed fish compared to wild trout. Farmed fish is nutritionally inferior to wild fish – bland, flabby and lower in beneficial Omega-3 fatty acids. The situation becomes worse when farmers use cheaper feed comprising ground-up feathers, abattoir waste, bean meal, canola oil, chicken fat and artificial colorants to provide that orange flesh colour.

Observers of farmed trout in Australian shops have described them as “pathetic specimens” – insipid, pale and wrinkled compared to the magnificent wild fish our waters produce naturally. The wild Taupo trout represents a free-range, organic, healthy and nutrient-dense food source that no farm can replicate.

A trout caught and often released by an overseas tourist or domestic sports fisher is effectively worth hundreds of dollars a kilogram to the economy when ancillary tourism and sports-related costs are factored in. Farmed trout struggles to sell for even $34 per kilogram – less than farmed salmon.

Environmental Disasters Waiting to Happen

Disease: A Global Problem with No Exceptions

The Ministry for Primary Industries has identified 36 different pathogens in fish farms across eleven countries. There is no disease-free fish farming country in the world. These intensive systems increase the risk of diseases such as whirling disease, fin rot, gill rot, furunculosis, parasites and viruses – and these pathogens inevitably end up in our rivers and lakes.

New Zealand’s current salmonid populations are remarkably disease-free precisely because we’ve avoided the intensive farming systems that create disease hotspots elsewhere. Once introduced, these diseases would threaten not just farmed fish but our entire wild trout ecosystem.

Genetic Contamination: Weakening Wild Stocks

Fish farms use limited breeding stock (broodstock) to provide eggs and milt, drastically reducing genetic variation. As broodstock age and are replaced by young farmed fish, genetic diversity weakens further. When these genetically impoverished fish escape – and they always do – this genetic weakness spreads to wild populations, reducing their resilience and long-term sustainability.

International experience shows genetic damage occurs when escaping farm trout mate with wild stock. Wild trout populations also suffer when they waste energy defending territory against escaped farm fish rather than reproducing successfully.

Water Pollution: The Hidden Cost

Intensively reared fish produce massive amounts of waste. The faecal matter, ammonia, nitrites and carbon dioxide from thousands of confined fish, combined with mortalities (up to 30% in some salmon farms) and uneaten food, create pollution loads that overwhelm natural systems unless micro-filtered – an expensive process often skipped to save costs.

Historically, trout farms have been established on rivers that subsequently became polluted by effluent from fish feeding operations. The chemicals used – growth hormones including testosterone, antibiotics, and fungicides – also end up in waterways, creating long-term ecological impacts.

Learning from International Disasters

We don’t need to guess about the environmental impacts of trout farming – the evidence is clear from decades of experience overseas. Commercial trout and salmon farming has caused ecological disasters in the United States, South America and Europe, introducing disease and causing environmental degradation while contributing to black market poaching.

Why would New Zealand voluntarily import these problems when we have a functioning, profitable, and environmentally sustainable system already?

The Marine Connection: Making Ocean Problems Worse

One of the most perverse aspects of trout farming is its impact on marine ecosystems. Wild sea fish are processed into pellets for feeding farmed trout. Rather than reducing pressure on our depleted marine ecosystems, trout farming actually increases it. This represents the opposite of sustainability – taking wild fish to feed confined fish that produce an inferior product.

The Poaching Problem: Creating Crime Where None Exists

Currently, trout cannot be sold in New Zealand, removing any commercial incentive for poaching. Once trout have a saleable value, black market operations inevitably develop, just as they have for recreationally gathered seafood and whitebait.

Trout are most vulnerable during spawning, when they gather in predictable locations. Commercial markets for trout would create pressure for illegal harvest that could devastate both fish stocks and fragile spawning grounds. The enforcement burden and ecological damage would far outweigh any theoretical economic benefits.

Political and Social Reality

Beyond the environmental and economic arguments lies a political reality that proponents consistently ignore. Trout farming motivates a committed and large voting block of over 200,000 licence-holding New Zealand anglers who vote on this single issue and can influence elections.

These aren’t just casual weekend fishers – they include wealthy, influential people who have made clear they will spend whatever is necessary to prevent trout farming. They represent a powerful political force with deep pockets and strong motivation.

Any politician considering supporting trout farming faces the prospect of losing every trout angler’s vote, along with well-funded campaigns in their electorates. The raw political calculation is simple: risk a political career for marginal economic gains that pale beside the existing billion-dollar recreational fishery.

The Conservation Success Story We’re Protecting

New Zealand’s trout fishery represents one of the world’s great conservation success stories. Introduced in the 1880s, brown and rainbow trout have thrived in our clean, cold waters to create fisheries that are internationally renowned. We’re widely recognised as the premier trout fishing destination globally – something the country can genuinely be proud of.

Trout are an iconic clean water species, and healthy wild populations fit perfectly with our international brand as a clean, green destination. During COVID restrictions, we saw a significant increase in New Zealanders buying angling licences and discovering their own country’s fishing opportunities.

This isn’t just about recreation – it’s about maintaining ecological integrity. Our wild trout populations serve as indicators of ecosystem health, requiring the clean, well-oxygenated water that benefits entire freshwater ecosystems.

The Technology Red Herring

Proponents argue that modern recirculating aquaculture systems (RAS) could overcome environmental concerns by containing disease outbreaks and preventing escapes. While RAS technology reduces some risks, it doesn’t eliminate them and comes with massive additional costs that make already marginal economics even worse.

More fundamentally, RAS systems still require huge volumes of wild fish for feed, still produce inferior products, and still create waste and pollution challenges. The technology may be newer, but the fundamental problems remain unchanged.

A Simple Question: Why Fix What Isn’t Broken?

The most compelling argument against trout farming may be the simplest: our current system works brilliantly. We have a billion-dollar industry built on sustainable wild fisheries that provide recreation, tourism, food, and ecosystem services without the environmental risks of intensive farming.

Our world-unique ban on trout farming isn’t an oversight or missed opportunity – it’s recognition that some things are too valuable to risk for marginal economic gains. The recreational fishery provides:

• Sustainable economic returns exceeding farming projections by 20:1
• International recognition as a premier destination
• Cultural and recreational value spanning generations of families
• Ecosystem health indicators for our freshwater environments
• Clean, healthy protein for anglers and their communities
• Support for thousands of jobs in rural regions

The Way Forward: Protecting What We Have

As pressure mounts to overturn New Zealand’s trout farming ban, we must remember why this prohibition exists and what we stand to lose. The evidence from overseas demonstrates clearly that commercial trout farming creates environmental disasters, produces inferior products, and threatens the wild fisheries that make destinations famous.

New Zealand’s decision to maintain this ban represents wisdom, not missed opportunity. We have something unique and valuable – wild trout populations that thrive in clean waters, supporting a sustainable billion-dollar industry while maintaining ecological integrity.

The choice is clear: risk destroying a functioning, profitable, and environmentally sound system for the promise of marginal economic gains and certain environmental damage, or maintain our world-leading position in freshwater conservation and sustainable tourism.

Some things are too precious to gamble with. New Zealand’s wild trout fishery is one of them.

---

The evidence overwhelmingly supports maintaining New Zealand’s unique ban on trout farming. Our wild fisheries represent a conservation and economic success story that would be impossible to recreate once destroyed. The question isn’t whether we can afford to keep the ban – it’s whether we can afford to lose it.