Farmed fish vs Rice: carbon footprint
Farmed fish13.63kg CO₂e / kg
vs
Rice4.45kg CO₂e / kg
Farmed fish or Rice? Here's what each one costs the climate, measured per kilo over its whole life.
Farmed fish runs about 13.63 kg CO₂e a kilo. Rice runs 4.45.
Farmed fish is the heavier choice, about 3.1× Rice.
Swap Farmed fish for Rice and you cut about 9.18 kg a kilo, near 67% off.
Per kilo, that gap is a 54 km drive in a diesel car.
Farmed fish: Farmed fish and shrimp pay for feed, energy to run the ponds, and sometimes cleared mangroves.
Rice: Modest. Fertiliser, the field itself, and a bit of milling.
Per-kilo numbers skip portion size and how the food was farmed, so take them as the shape of things, not the last word.
More match-ups
Figures from OWID / Poore & Nemecek 2018, licensed CC-BY 4.0.
How we get these numbers: Methodology.