Marine shrimp farming is an aquaculture business for the cultivation of marine shrimp or for human consumption. Although traditional shrimp farming has been carried out in Asia for centuries, large-scale commercial shrimp farming began in the 1970s, and production grew steeply, particularly to match the market demands of the United States, Japan and Western Europe. The total global production of farmed shrimp reached more than 1.6 million in 2003, representing a value of nearly 9 billion U.S. do..