Aquaculture is the farming of aquatic organisms including fish, molluscs, crustaceans and aquatic plants. The global consumption of fish as food has doubled since the 1970's, however the maximum wild capture fishery potential from the world's oceans has now been reached, and inland fishery resources are largely over-exploited. To meet this demand, the contribution of aquaculture to world supplies of fish, crustaceans, molluscs and other aquatic animals continues to grow at a faster rate than all other animal producing sectors. There are over 250 different farmed aquatic animal and plant species, the majority being freshwater in nature. The top ten producers in terms of quantity are: China, India, Vietnam, Thailand, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Japan, Chile, Norway and the USA. (Information source: FAO).