Backers of aquaculture point out that with wild fish stocks declining around the world, nearly half the seafood on people's tables comes from farms. About 90 percent of farmed seafood comes from Asia.

The United States accounts for less that two percent of the 70 billion-dollar global business, said Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez, noting projections of a global shortfall of 40 million tons of seafood by 2030.

"We have an eight billion-dollar seafood trade deficit," Gutierrez said.

"We need both a strong commercial fishing industry and a robust aquaculture industry. Given the projections, there is plenty of room for both industries."

In the United States, most fish farms are on land-based tanks, with a few ocean operations for shellfish such as oysters, clams and mussels.

Legislation introduced in Congress would allow the US government to issue offshore aquaculture permits, provide incentives for research and set environmental standards.

Backers of aquaculture say it can also be a blessing for coastal communities hurt by cutbacks in fishing due to new quotas to prevent depletion of fisheries.

The push for more aquaculture has posed a dilemma for environmentalists, who worry about pollution from farms, diseases from escaped fish and other potential impacts on wild species. At the same time, most activists recognize that overfishing of wild species is a problem that can only be alleviated through increases in farming of fish.

"If it happens we want to make sure its done in the most sustainable way," said the Ocean Conservancy's Tim Eichenberg, who attended the Washington summit.

Eichenberg said strong US environmental standards could help encourage better practices in other countries.

"We don't have any jurisdiction in foreign countries, but if we're not regulating it here, we can't ask other countries to do it in a sustainable way," he said.

"Additionally, if we don't have strong standards in the US, we can't keep products out of our country that are not produced in a sustainable way."

Andrea Kavanagh of the National Environmental Trust's Pure Salmon Campaign said the proposed legislation needs tougher environmental standards.

"The bill only makes a passing mention to environmental standards," she said. "That's not good enough."

Kavanagh said better practices include farming of fish lower on the food chain instead of carnivorous species -- which are generally fed with ground-up meal from wild-caught fish.

"For species like cod and halibut, you have to feed them fish and you get the fish from the wild -- and that contributes more to the problem of overfishing," she said.

She said some salmon farms use floating concrete tanks, which she said offers more protection against fish escapes than open-net tanks used by others.

"We think you can raise fish in an environmentally sustainable way and you can still make a profit," she said. "It requires a shift away from wild-caught feed and a move away from open-net cages."

Michael Rubino, aquaculture program director for the Commerce Department's National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration, said he believes US operations can compete against those from other countries, including China.

Rubino said 60 percent of the cost of farm-raised fish comes from feed, and another 20 percent from hatchery operations.

"There are investors ready to go to three miles and beyond" once the proper regulations are in place, he said.

"We're lacking a regulatory framework for federal waters."

Others say aquaculture represents a potential for enormous growth.

David Tze, managing director Aquacopia, a venture capital firm with holdings in aquaculture, said some investors who were looking at the Internet and computer technology a decade ago are now looking at fish farms.

"This is really a technology business," Tze told the summit participants. "It is an undervalued sector and is attracting increasing (investor) attention."

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