Skilled agricultural, forestry and fishery workers · code 6221

Aquaculture workers

AI can market the oysters. Growing them is still hands in cold water.

Delivering and marketing the product is the one task AI could take a fair chunk of. It barely touches seven of the ten, including preparing fish and keeping tanks and boats in shape.

What they actually do (and what else they get called)

Aquaculture workers breed and raise fish and cultivate mussels, oysters and other forms of aquatic life, for sale or delivery on a regular basis to wholesale buyers, marketing organizations or at markets. Tasks include - (a) breeding, raising and cultivating fish, mussels, oysters and other forms of aquatic life as cash crops or for release into freshwater or saltwater; (b) collecting and recording growth, production and environmental data; (c) conducting and supervising stock examinations in order to identify diseases or parasites; (d) monitoring environments to ensure maintenance of optimum conditions for aquatic life; (e) directing and monitoring trapping and spawning of fish, egg incubation and fry rearing, applying knowledge of management and fish culturing techniques; (f) cleaning, freezing, icing or salting catch on- or offshore, and preparing fish and other products for shipment; (g) maintaining buildings, tanks, machinery, boats and other equipment; (h) delivering or marketing products; (i) renting or investing in buildings, equipment and machinery, and purchasing food and other supplies; (j) supervising and training aquaculture and fish hatchery support workers. Examples of the occupations classified here: - Algae cultivator - Fish farmer - Oyster farmer - Pearl cultivator - Seafood farmer - Skilled fish farm worker - Skilled seafood farm worker Some related occupations classified elsewhere: - Aquaculture production manager - 1312 - Aquaculture labourer - 9216

aquaculture hatchery worker
aquaculture hatchery manager
aquaculture hatchery technician
aquaculture rearing technician
aquaculture recirculation technician
aquaculture husbandry worker
aquaculture mooring manager
aquaculture cage technician
aquaculture husbandry technician
aquaculture harvesting technician
water-based aquaculture technician

Job titles from the EU's ESCO list. Search for any of them on the jobs page and you'll end up here.

78 / 100

Mostly holds up against AI

AI can take a few chores off your plate, but most of the day is still yours.

Not the odds you keep your job. It's how much of the everyday work still needs a person, out of 100.

← Robot's turf Human's turf →

The ILO's official verdict: Not Exposed

175 of 427 for holding up against AI

Why this score?

The ILO rated each of this job's 10 tasks for how much of it AI could do. They average 22.5 out of 100, so it holds up at 100 − 22.5 = 77.5.

That's the whole sum. No black box, no secret sauce: you can check it against the ILO's study. ILO group “Not Exposed”: None of this job's tasks scored high enough to count.

from the source Working Paper 140, Generative AI and Jobs 2025 index data 0.8-observed-use

Pinch of salt: this number is probably too rosy

It only asks what AI software could do, and this job is 61 out of 100 hands-on. A chatbot can't do that part. A robot might, one day, and nobody measures how close that is.

Man v Bot · compare

Who holds up better?

Aquaculture workers 78

Go on, try your partner's job. Or your sibling's. We won't tell.

Man v Bot

Where the bot helps, and where the human wins

Bot

What AI takes

The routine stuff. You may not miss it.

Marketing and sales.
Recording growth and environmental data.
Water quality monitoring.

Man

What people still do better

Judgement, trust and skilled hands. Hard to download.

Raising and harvesting stock.
Checking for disease and parasites.
Maintaining tanks, boats and equipment.

Both

What's arriving

New work that only exists because the AI does.

Automated feeding and sensors.
Seaweed and shellfish farming.
Sustainability certification.

Written by a human, from the ILO's task ratings below. Yes, we see the irony. Read it as one person's take.

Meet your two rivals

They're not the same machine. AI software can only reach the parts of a job done on a screen or in words. A chatbot can't climb a ladder. A robot might, one day, if it doesn't fall off.

The AI

Lives in a screen. Never had to fix a boiler.

Threat level: Medium

41 could do without you

It could take over some of the work, and help with more. It could help with 66 of 100.

The robot

The wildcard. Has hands, still working out stairs.

How much it matters here: Higher

61 how hands-on

Most of this job needs hands, a body or turning up. That's robot territory, and nobody measures how far robots have got well enough to give you a number. We won't make one up.

So could a robot do the physical part?

Less fine handwork and fewer cramped spaces than a typical hands-on job. That clears one hurdle for machines. It doesn't mean machines are doing this work yet.

Robots hate fiddly work in awkward spaces. On that measure, this job scores 38 out of 100. The higher it is, the longer the robot waits.

61 How
hands-on

38 How fiddly
and cramped

Kind of hands-on work Hands-on, less fiddly work

The small print

They aren't a robot score, and nothing on this page is. Nobody measures how far robots have got well enough to put a number on it. These are the closest thing we have: how hands-on the job is, and how much fiddly, cramped work it takes, which is what Frey and Osborne found hardest for machines.

From O*NET, averaged across 2 US jobs .

finger skill 41 · hand skill 39.3 · cramped spaces 32.2 · averaged · rule: hands-on 50+ · fiddly under 39.4

estimated O*NET 31.0 BLS occupational crosswalk chain ISCO-08 to 2010 SOC (Aug 2012, rev. Jun 2015); 2010 to 2018 SOC (Nov 2017); O*NET-SOC 2019 taxonomy data 0.8-observed-use measures chosen by Frey & Osborne (2017) · the grouping is a sorting, not a measurement

The job, task by task

Every job is really a bundle of tasks. Here's this one unpacked, with how much of each AI could do, out of 100. The score is the average, and averages can hide a lot.

AI's favourite task here scores 56, against an average of 23. The bigger the gap, the more lopsided the job: some of it wide open to AI, some of it barely touched.

56
Delivering or marketing products

Medium
44
Collecting and recording growth, production and environmental data

Low
28
Supervising and training aquaculture and fish hatchery support workers.

Low
17
Conducting and supervising stock examinations in order to identify diseases or parasites

Very Low
15
Monitoring environments to ensure maintenance of optimum conditions for aquatic life

Very Low
14
Breeding, raising and cultivating fish, mussels, oysters and other forms of aquatic life as cash crops or for release into freshwater or saltwater

Very Low
14
Directing and monitoring trapping and spawning of fish, egg incubation and fry rearing, applying knowledge of management and fish culturing techniques

Very Low
14
Renting or investing in buildings, equipment and machinery, and purchasing food and other supplies

Very Low
13
Cleaning, freezing, icing or salting catch on- or offshore, and preparing fish and other products for shipment

Very Low
12
Maintaining buildings, tanks, machinery, boats and other equipment

Very Low

10 tasks · the High to Very Low labels are the ILO's

from the source Working Paper 140, Generative AI and Jobs 2025 index data 0.8-observed-use

Sidekick or replacement?

A tool that makes you faster is a very different thing from one that does the task while you watch. Jobs and Skills Australia measured the two separately, which is handy.

AI helps you: 66
AI does it for you: 41

Sidekick wins, by 25 points.

How good a match is this?

1 Australian jobs match this one, and we've simply averaged them. Treat the numbers as a rough guide.

estimated Our Gen AI Transition (Gen AI Capacity Study) September 2025 detailed data release data 0.8-observed-use matched to Australian jobs 1211, 3631

So, should aquaculture workers be worried?

Short answer: not much. Some of the chores will change, and good riddance.

Parts of it are changing. Marketing products is rated Medium, and recording data and supervising are Low; raising, examining and harvesting stock rate Very Low. Sensors and software help run the farm; the farming stays hands-on.

Worth remembering: we score tasks, not jobs. When AI takes on a task, the job usually reshuffles around it rather than vanishing.

Where this job could lead

None of the new jobs we've written up start from here yet. Could be you're the first. See the jobs AI is creating →

How are the neighbours doing?

There are 18 jobs in the “Skilled agricultural, forestry and fishery workers” family, averaging 84. This one is below the family average.

Pit this against any other job →