Exposing Aquaculture’s Cruelty with Laura Lee Cascada

This episode explores the hidden realities of fish farming with Laura Lee Cascada, founder of the Aquaculture Accountability Project. Despite being marketed as an environmentally friendly solution to overfishing, aquaculture has created factory farms on water that cause widespread suffering to sea animals, contribute to environmental degradation, and pose serious human health risks. Cascada debunks the industry’s greenwashing tactics and reveals how farmed fishing has actually increased overall fish consumption while failing to reduce, and even increasing, pressure on wild populations.

This episode explores:

• • • How the aquaculture industry has used deceptive marketing to position itself as environmentally sustainable while creating factory farms on water
    • Why farmed fish operations often require wild-caught fish as feed, intensifying rather than reducing overfishing
    • The severe welfare concerns for sea animals in crowded, disease-prone farming operations
    • The environmental impact of open-net pens that spread disease, waste, and antibiotics into surrounding waters
    • Practical steps institutions and individuals can take to reduce harm to sea animals and oceans

ABOUT OUR GUEST

Laura Lee Cascada is an environmental advocate and investigative researcher with a master’s degree from Johns Hopkins and 15+ years advancing evidence-based food system change. She founded the Aquaculture Accountability Project to expose misleading sustainability narratives driving industrial fish farming and support a shift to ocean-friendly meals. Previously, her reporting helped shut down Hawaii’s only octopus farm, and she has led campaigns advancing plant-forward commitments across cities and major companies. A freediver and lifelong ocean lover, Laura is driven by a vision for a food system that genuinely protects our oceans.

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