A new law signed by California Gov. Gavin Newsom bars anyone in the state from participating in octopus aquaculture or sale of octopi harvested from aquaculture activities.
Written by Assemblymember Steve Bennett, D-Ventura, AB 3162 stems from research that aquatic farms are unable to sufficiently sustain octopi due to their high intelligence and dietary requirements. The bill cites a London School of Economics analysis that found the animals grow aggressive when kept in confinement.
Similar bills are circulating in other coastal states and the Opposing the Cultivation and Trade of Octopus Produced through Unethical Strategies Act was introduced in Congress this year.
Bennet also authored AB 2220 this session, which would have placed greater restrictions on gillnet fishing. He pulled the bill before it came out of committee.
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AB 3162 was cosponsored by the Animal Legal Defense Fund and Social Compassion in Legislation. ALDF said previous methods of slaughtering octopi —including clubbing, slicing, asphyxiation and chilling — were inhumane.
The industry also poses environmental degradation and risks to other seafood industries, Tessa Gonzalez, the Aquatic Life Institute’s head of research, said in an ALDF press release.
“Rather than turning to unproven 'farming’ methods to raise and slaughter octopuses, we should be protecting our marine ecosystem to better enable marine species to rebound,” the bill’s co-author, Asm. Laura Friedman, said in the release.
