Projects
Policy Project: Animal Welfare, Biosecurity, and Food Safety.
Regulations on Pre-Slaughter Stunning Requirements in Ghana: This project aims to establish clear, species-specific guidelines for pre-slaughter stunning to reduce biosecurity risks and ensure humane practices in slaughterhouses across Ghana.
FISH FIRST Project
Ghana's aquaculture sector is one of the fastest-growing in Africa. Cage farming on Lake Volta accounts for about 90% of the country's farmed fish, almost all of it Nile tilapia. Production has grown from roughly 7,500 metric tons in 2009 to 100,000 metric tons by 2023, with a national target of 177,000 metric tons by 2027. At an average harvest weight of 400g, that's approximately 250 million individual fish per year, and the number is rising.
The sector is also highly concentrated. Around 101 producers account for nearly 90% of tilapia output. A single producer represented an estimated 10 to 15% of total production in 2024. That concentration means welfare failures in even one large operation can affect very large numbers of fish at once.
Ghana's legal framework does not yet include enforceable welfare standards for farmed fish. Fish First is working to change that. We advocate for the inclusion of specific, enforceable fish welfare provisions in Ghana's national fisheries legislation, so that as production scales, basic protections scale with it.