The United States needs to better regulate aquaculture operations, which are expected to grow fivefold into more than a $5 billion industry by 2025, according to a report released yesterday.

At present, the aquaculture industry, which includes 70 Hawai'i operations, provides about half of all seafood consumed in the United States. However, the nation's growing reliance on ocean farming operations will require new standards and practices to ensure protection of marine ecosystems, according to the Marine Aquaculture Task Force, a group of researchers, educators and aquaculture operators.

"In just a few years, most of the seafood we consume will come from aquaculture," said task force member Daniel Benetti, an associate professor and the director of aquaculture at the University of Miami. "The question is not whether we should endorse it. The question is how and where we should do it."

The report recommends that Congress impose strong environmental standards to regulate the location and practice of off-shore aquaculture operations. The group also recommended that the cultivation of nonnative and genetically modified species be avoided. Additionally, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration should take the lead in regulating the industry and in fostering development of sustainable aquaculture feeds, the report said. Currently, it takes about 13 pounds of feed products made from wild fish to grow 2 pounds of high-quality farm-raised fish, according to the report.

"As research in this area continues, it will be a major challenge for the industry to continue to grow while reducing its dependence on wild fish for feeds," said task force member Bruce Anderson, president of the Oceanic Institute, in a news release. "To do this, U.S. marine aquaculture must focus on the development of feed alternatives."

The Oceanic Institute is engaged in such research, Anderson said.

In Hawai'i, aquaculture generated $28.4 million in sales in 2005. The state leases 193 acres of offshore lands in three separate leases. Among these operations is Kona Blue Water Farms LLC, which raises fish in pens anchored in 200 feet of water off the Big Island's Kona Coast. Founded in 2001, the company raises amberjack that is marketed under the trademarked name Kona Kampachi.

Neil Sims, president of Kona Blue, said the company supported the report.

"Given the past depletion and ongoing pressure on wild fish stocks, and the increasing demand for healthful sources of nutritious, delicious protein, the U.S. should and must foster an offshore aquaculture industry," he said in a written statement. "Kona Blue believes that open-ocean fish farming should be held to the highest practicable environmental standards.

"We ourselves aspire to such standards, and we believe that the public expects and deserves the same of other offshore fish farms in U.S. waters."

Report sponsors include the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, The Pew Charitable Trusts and the Lenfest Foundation. Participants included the Oceanic Institute and the University of Hawai'i.

Reach Sean Hao at shao@honoluluadvertiser.com.