Global Aquafeed Market Outlook, 2031

Global seafood consumption and supply chains have propelled the aquafeed market into an era defined by innovation, sustainability, and technological refinement. In Asia‑Pacific, where aquaculture contributes a significant portion of global edible seafood output, producers in China, Vietnam, and India have driven demand for nutrition solutions tailored to species such as tilapia, pangasius, and shrimp, prompting manufacturers to refine formulations with balanced protein sources, energy levels, and micronutrient blends that align with rapid production cycles. In regions like Latin America, particularly in Brazil and Ecuador, the expansion of shrimp and tilapia farms has encouraged local feed mills to adopt precision extrusion technologies that improve pellet water stability and reduce feed losses, thereby enhancing growth performance while curbing environmental impact. Across Europe and North America, the integration of digital feed formulation platforms and in‑pond monitoring tools has enabled aquafeed formulators to respond more accurately to changing water conditions, feeding behavior, and nutrient requirements, resulting in diets that support optimized feed conversion ratios and better animal health outcomes. At the same time, sustainability goals have influenced ingredient sourcing, leading to increased use of plant proteins, insect meals, and algae‑based oils in commercial diets to reduce pressure on marine resources and meet regulatory expectations. Functional feed additives such as probiotics, prebiotics, and targeted amino acid blends have gained traction in commercial operations because they support immune function and digestive efficiency, especially relevant in systems facing frequent disease pressures like bacterial outbreaks in shrimp nurseries or parasitic challenges in salmon cages.

Recent developments in the global aquafeed sector showcase a blend of technological advancement, enhanced species‑specific nutrition, and strategic regional responses to production and environmental challenges. Major feed producers such as Cargill Aqua Nutrition have invested in tailored feed lines that address specific species needs, combining high‑performance extruded pellets with optimized amino acid profiles to support muscle development and robust growth in tilapia and salmon under variable farming conditions. BioMar has focused on precision nutrition that improves feed utilization and reduces waste, incorporating feed enzymes and digestibility enhancers to boost nutrient absorption, an approach increasingly relevant where producers face tighter environmental regulations around effluent management. In Asia‑Pacific markets like Indonesia and the Philippines, shrimp producers have accelerated adoption of fortified diets that include probiotics and natural immunostimulants to mitigate frequent disease pressures, while localized feed mills have scaled up capacity to meet the needs of rapidly expanding rural aquaculture clusters. European collaborations between feed companies and research institutions have resulted in innovations in sustainable raw material sourcing—such as plant protein blends and algae‑derived oils to reduce reliance on wild‑capture fishmeal without compromising nutritional quality. Developments in Latin America have seen feed formulators adapt energy and protein ratios specifically for warm freshwater species like pacu and tambaqui, reflecting regional production patterns and ingredient availabilities. Across North America, adoption of data‑driven feeding strategies supported by real‑time growth monitoring and automated feeders enables aquaculture managers to fine‑tune feed delivery based on fish behavior and environmental data, strengthening operational efficiency.

Market Dynamics

Market Drivers

• Rising Seafood Consumption: The global increase in seafood consumption, particularly in regions like Asia-Pacific and North America, has intensified demand for aquafeed. Countries such as China, Vietnam, and India have expanded intensive aquaculture operations to supply both domestic and international markets. As production scales up, the need for nutrient-rich feeds that support faster growth, better feed conversion, and healthier fish has become crucial, driving innovation in dry, moist, and wet feed formulations enriched with additives like amino acids, vitamins, and probiotics.
• Technological Feed Innovations: Advancements in feed technology, including extrusion, pellet coating, and additive fortification, are enabling aquafeed manufacturers to produce species-specific diets with improved digestibility and stability. Companies like Cargill Aqua Nutrition, Skretting, and BioMar have developed specialized feeds for salmon, tilapia, and shrimp that enhance growth rates and disease resistance. These innovations reduce feed wastage, improve water quality in farms, and support sustainable practices, making high-performance feeds increasingly essential for modern aquaculture operations worldwide.



Market Challenges

• High Feed Ingredient Costs: Fluctuations in raw material prices, particularly fishmeal, soybean meal, and oils, pose significant challenges for aquafeed producers. Dependence on imported ingredients in regions like Southeast Asia and Latin America increases operational costs, affecting affordability for small and medium-sized farms. This volatility can limit the adoption of nutrient-dense formulations and forces manufacturers to seek alternative proteins or lower-cost formulations without compromising feed efficiency or growth performance.
• Disease and Environmental Risks: Aquaculture systems are vulnerable to diseases like White Spot Syndrome in shrimp and bacterial infections in finfish, which can be exacerbated by poor feed quality or overfeeding. Environmental factors, such as water pollution or temperature fluctuations, also impact feed utilization and growth. Ensuring consistent nutrition under variable conditions remains a challenge for feed producers, requiring investments in fortified feed, probiotics, and farm management practices to mitigate losses.

Market Trends

• Sustainable Feed Ingredients: The shift toward sustainability is driving the adoption of plant-based proteins, insect meal, and algae-derived oils in aquafeed. Companies such as BioMar and Cargill are exploring alternative ingredients to reduce reliance on wild-caught fishmeal, addressing ecological concerns while maintaining nutritional quality. This trend is supported by consumer demand for eco-friendly seafood and regulatory pressure to lower the environmental footprint of aquaculture operations.
• Functional and Fortified Feeds: There is growing emphasis on incorporating additives like probiotics, prebiotics, amino acids, and antioxidants to improve fish immunity, gut health, and growth efficiency. European and Asian shrimp farms increasingly use fortified feeds to combat pathogens and stress, enhancing survival rates and productivity. This trend reflects the industry’s move toward preventive health management and high-performance nutrition, ensuring both economic and environmental sustainability in modern aquaculture.

Segmentation Analysis

Dry feed ensures longer shelf life and ease of storage, making it highly preferred among commercial aquaculture operations.

Dry feed has become a cornerstone in aquaculture practices across the globe, particularly in intensive fish and shrimp farming operations in countries like Norway, Chile, and Vietnam. Its stable composition allows farmers to precisely control nutrient intake while minimizing wastage, which is critical in large-scale operations where feed efficiency directly impacts growth and profitability. Companies such as Cargill Aqua Nutrition and Skretting have developed specialized dry pellets that float or sink depending on species requirements, enabling visual monitoring of feeding activity and reducing environmental contamination from uneaten feed. Unlike moist or wet feed, dry feed does not spoil quickly, even under variable storage conditions, which allows suppliers and farmers to plan logistics efficiently and maintain consistent quality over extended periods. Innovations in extrusion technology have also enhanced nutrient retention and pellet durability, providing balanced protein, lipid, and micronutrient profiles for species ranging from salmon and tilapia to shrimp and carp. In addition, dry feed supports automated feeding systems in modern aquaculture facilities, facilitating scalable operations with less labor and minimizing human error in feeding schedules. The ability to fortify dry feed with functional additives such as probiotics, antioxidants, and amino acids further strengthens fish health and immunity, which is especially critical in regions where disease outbreaks like White Spot Syndrome in shrimp farms or bacterial infections in salmon farms can lead to significant losses. As global aquaculture intensifies to meet rising seafood demand, the preference for dry feed continues to grow, highlighting its role as a reliable, cost-efficient, and technologically adaptable solution for sustainable and productive aquaculture practices worldwide.

Fish feed dominates due to its adaptability for multiple freshwater and marine species, supporting high growth rates and efficient nutrition delivery.

Fish feed remains the backbone of aquaculture nutrition in both freshwater and marine environments, largely because it can be formulated to match the specific dietary needs of high-demand species like Atlantic salmon, Nile tilapia, and pangasius. Skretting, BioMar, and Aller Aqua have pioneered species-specific feed ranges that include floating or sinking pellets enriched with vitamins, minerals, and essential fatty acids, ensuring optimized growth and survival rates. Unlike crustacean or mollusk feed, fish feed is highly versatile and can incorporate performance-enhancing additives such as probiotics, feed enzymes, and antioxidants to improve gut health, nutrient absorption, and disease resistance. In regions like Chile and Norway, salmon farmers rely heavily on high-protein fish feed to support accelerated growth cycles, while in Southeast Asia, tilapia and pangasius operations benefit from feeds tailored to freshwater conditions with controlled moisture and digestible energy content. Fish feed also enables the use of sustainable ingredients, including plant-based proteins and alternative oils, reducing reliance on wild fishmeal and promoting environmentally responsible aquaculture. The precise formulation of feed helps maintain water quality by minimizing uneaten residues and reducing nutrient runoff, which is crucial in intensive pond, cage, and recirculating aquaculture systems. By allowing aquaculture operators to fine-tune nutrition for growth stage, species, and environment, fish feed provides both biological and operational advantages that are difficult to achieve with crustacean or mollusk feeds, ensuring its continued prominence in commercial aquaculture worldwide.

Additives like probiotics and amino acids are critical for enhancing growth, immunity, and feed conversion efficiency in cultured species.

Functional additives in aquafeed play a transformative role in modern aquaculture, addressing challenges such as disease outbreaks, stress from high-density farming, and variable water conditions. Companies such as DSM Nutritional Products, Evonik, and Nutreco have developed proprietary probiotic strains and amino acid blends specifically designed to improve gut microbiota, enhance digestion, and stimulate immune responses in species including shrimp, salmon, and tilapia. Antioxidants and vitamins help prevent oxidative stress and support metabolic activity, while feed enzymes increase nutrient availability, reducing waste and promoting faster growth. In Asia-Pacific, shrimp farming operations in Vietnam and Thailand routinely incorporate feed acidifiers and antiparasitics to reduce the prevalence of White Spot Syndrome Virus and bacterial infections. Amino acids such as lysine and methionine are used to balance protein quality in plant-based diets, enabling the replacement of traditional fishmeal without compromising growth performance. The strategic use of these additives also supports sustainable aquaculture practices by improving feed conversion ratios, thereby lowering feed inputs per unit of biomass produced. Advances in encapsulation and controlled-release technology allow vitamins and probiotics to remain stable through extrusion and storage, ensuring that cultured species receive consistent nutritional benefits. By integrating multiple functional additives, feed manufacturers can tailor diets to species-specific requirements, optimize health outcomes, and mitigate risks associated with intensive farming, demonstrating the indispensable role of additives in enhancing productivity, profitability, and sustainability in aquaculture operations worldwide.

Regional Analysis

Asia-Pacific leads aquaculture production, driving regional dominance in aquafeed consumption due to high seafood demand and export-oriented farming.

Asia-Pacific has emerged as the primary hub for aquaculture, with countries like China, India, Vietnam, and Thailand leading global production of finfish, shrimp, and mollusks. This high production volume has created substantial demand for specialized aquafeed, supplied by companies such as Cargill Aqua Nutrition, Skretting, and PT Central Proteina Prima. The region’s dominance is fueled by both domestic consumption, where seafood is a dietary staple, and export-oriented operations supplying markets in Europe, Japan, and the United States. Vietnam, for example, has developed advanced shrimp feed formulations that incorporate probiotics and high-quality protein to improve yield and disease resistance, catering to the white-leg shrimp industry. China has focused on fish feed innovation for species such as tilapia and carp, integrating vitamins, antioxidants, and amino acids to maximize growth while maintaining water quality in intensive pond systems. Regulatory support and investments in aquaculture infrastructure, such as recirculating aquaculture systems in Japan and controlled shrimp ponds in Thailand, further enhance feed utilization efficiency and production consistency. The adoption of modern extrusion technologies enables production of dry, moist, and wet feeds adapted to species-specific requirements, while local feed mills meet regional logistical needs. Rising consumer demand for safe, high-quality seafood has encouraged the expansion of fortified feeds with functional additives that enhance immunity and improve nutritional content.

Key Developments

• In October 2025, Skretting (Nutreco N.V.) launched Necto, a new functional fish feed incorporating proprietary EDGEOS PhytoComplexes to enhance fish health, welfare, and resilience. Developed in collaboration with research partners, the product represents the first commercial application of these plant-derived complexes in aquafeed. The launch highlights the aquafeed industry’s shift toward health-focused, functional nutrition solutions beyond basic growth performance.
• In September 2025, BioMar, Innovafeed, and Auchan have formed a strategic partnership to advance the commercialization and supply of insect-derived meal for aquaculture feeds. This collaboration focuses on scaling industrial production and incorporating high-quality insect protein into aquafeed value chains, promoting sustainable nutrition solutions.
• In September 2025, ADM introduced Nutripiscis Oxygen, a new nutritional solution designed to enhance tilapia productivity and resilience in the face of environmental stress in aquaculture. The formulation helps reduce oxidative and intestinal stress, supporting improved biomass gain and production efficiency in challenging farming conditions. This launch strengthens ADM’s aquafeed portfolio and reflects growing demand for performance-enhancing nutrition solutions in the tilapia segment.
• In December 2024, Aller Aqua Group partnered with AquaRech to improve access to high-quality fish feeds for fish farmers across Kenya. This collaboration combines Aller Aqua’s expertise in premium feed production with AquaRech’s extensive Last Mile Distribution System, ensuring consistent supply and accessibility in key regions. The partnership is set to enhance fish health and growth, significantly reducing production cycles from 14 to 8 months, while supporting sustainable aquaculture practices. This strengthens Aller Aqua’s position as one of the leaders in the African aquaculture industry, driving growth and supporting local farming communities.
• In June 2024, Nutreco launched its innovative "Garden of the Future," marking a significant advancement in phytotechnology. This groundbreaking initiative focuses on developing cutting-edge phytotechnology solutions designed to enhance the performance, health, and welfare of aquatic species, as well as farm and companion animals. The "Garden of the Future" represents a forward-thinking approach, leveraging advanced plant-based technologies to improve animal nutrition and overall well-being.
• In February 2024, Skretting, a Norway-based leading aquafeed-producing company, announced the launch of its all-new production facility in Surat, India. The new facility is said to be equipped with state-of-the-art technology with three production lines, which are expected to have a production capacity of around 50,000 metric tons per annum.
• In January 2024, the joint venture between ADM and Vitafort opened a new state-of-the-art feed mill in Hungary that is poised to achieve full production capacity. This reflects ADM's steadfast commitment to ushering in a new era of modernization in the region's production infrastructure.
• In July 2023, Charoen Pokphand Foods PCL partnered with the Thai Sustainable Fisheries Roundtable (TSFR) to promote the conservation and protection of the ecosystem and resources in the Gulf of Thailand through the Fishery Action Plan (FAP), a crucial component of the Fishery Improvement Project (FIP). This determination is strengthening the company’s commitment to a responsible aquafeed raw material supply chain.