The blue food portfolio is highly diverse. There are more than 3,000 species of marine and freshwater animals and plants used for food. Blue foods can be a cornerstone of good nutrition and health. Many of them are rich in bioavailable micronutrients that help prevent maternal and infant mortality, stunting, and cognitive deficits. Blue foods can be a healthier animal-source protein than terrestrial livestock: they are rich in healthy fats and can help reduce obesity and non-communicable diseases. Blue foods are important to livelihoods in many vulnerable communities. FAO estimates indicate that about 800 million people make their living in blue food systems, mostly in small-scale fisheries and aquaculture.

Wild capture fisheries, both marine and freshwater, need to be better managed, as many fish stocks have become severely depleted and some technologies have high environmental footprints. Although aquaculture is becoming increasingly sustainable, growing use of feed in some sectors is putting pressure on the environment through overfishing, deforestation for feed crops and intensification of agricultural production. Intensification of aquaculture can concentrate nutrient pollution and exacerbate risks associated with pathogens and high dependence on antibiotics.

Blue foods are the most highly-traded food products –for developing countries, net revenues from trade of blue foods exceed those of all agricultural commodities combined.

There is every reason to expect that total demand for blue foods will grow substantially in the years ahead, as population and incomes increase, and as attention toward healthy and sustainable food expands. If produced responsibly, they have essential roles to play in ending malnutrition and in building healthy, nature-positive and resilient food systems. Realizing that potential, however, will require that governments are thoughtful about how to develop those roles. In the Brief, three central imperatives for policymakers are listed:

1. Integrate blue foods into decision-making about food system policies, programs, and budgets, to enable effective management of production, consumption and trade, and the interconnections with terrestrial food production. Specifically, governments should:

- Create a governance structure that integrates green and blue;

- Govern blue foods as a food system;

- Include blue foods in all food system policies.

2. Understand, protect and develop their potential in ending malnutrition, fostering production of accessible, affordable nutritious foods. Governments should:

- Recognize the centrality of the Right to Food in blue food trade and domestic policy;

- Harness the nutritional diversity of blue foods;

- Halt loss of nutrients from blue food systems;

- Improve the distributional equity of blue food production and consumption.

3. Support the central role of small-scale actors, with governance and finance that are responsive to their diverse needs, circumstances and opportunities. Supporting the viability of small-scale fisheries and aquaculture (SSFA) requires governments to:

- Include actors from SSFA in decision-making and policy development;

- Expand capabilities through investment in institutions and human capital, and investment in environmental protection and restoration;

- Support diversification and sustainable intensification.