Aquaculture Archives - Page 52 of 86

MAINE: Dutch company chooses Down East town as home for its multimillion-dollar fish farm

November 21, 2019 — A Dutch company has reportedly selected the Washington County town of Jonesport for a multimillion-dollar, land-based aquaculture facility to grow yellowtail, a type of fish beloved by chefs and sushi aficionados.

Kingfish Zeeland settled on the historic fishing community roughly 20 miles from Machias after exploring other potential sites along the Maine coast, according to reports in local and seafood industry media. Kingfish Zeeland’s envisioned yellowtail facility is at least the fourth major land-based aquaculture operation proposed in recent years in Maine, which is experiencing a surge in “farming” for fish, shellfish and other marine products.

Company representatives were expected to discuss their plans Wednesday night during a special town meeting in Jonesport. The company did not respond to a request for additional information Wednesday, and a member of the Jonesport Board of Selectmen said town officials are waiting for Wednesday’s meeting before commenting.

“We are anxious to hear their presentation,” Selectman William Milliken said.

Read the full story at The Portland Press Herald

FAO leaders assess state of the world’s fisheries at sustainability symposium

November 20, 2019 — The number of overfished stocks has been growing for years, but the commonly cited statistic that 90 percent of stocks are in peril doesn’t accurately reflect the health of the world’s oceans.

Manual Barange, the policy and resource director at the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization’s Fisheries and Aquaculture division, carefully differentiated maximally fished stocks and overfished stocks during his keynote address at FAO’s International Symposium on Sustainable Fisheries in Rome, Italy this week.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

GSSI Public Consultation on the ASC Shrimp Standard Scope Extension

November 15, 2019 — The following was released by the Global Sustainable Seafood Initiative:

On 23 October 2019, GSSI launched a 30-day public consultation on the Interim GSSI Benchmark Report for the Aquaculture Stewardship Council (ASC) Shrimp Standard Scope Extension.

In early 2019, the ASC applied to extend the scope of its GSSI recognition to include its Shrimp Standard, having already obtained recognition for the scope of its Salmon Standard in August 2018.

The Independent Experts and the Benchmark Committee found the ASC Shrimp Standard V1.0 – March 2014 to be in alignment with all the GSSI Essential Components for Section C (Aquaculture). The Independent Experts and the Benchmark Committee also confirmed the Governance (Section A) and Operational Procedures (Section B) have been appropriately applied to the ASC Shrimp Standard V1.0 – March 2014.

GSSI now invites comments from all stakeholders on the recommendation of the Benchmark Committee to include the ASC Shrimp Standard in the GSSI scope of recognition for the ASC.

Following the public consultation, the Benchmark Committee, Independent Experts and ASC will process the feedback received. GSSI’s Benchmark Committee will then provide the GSSI Steering Board with a final recommendation on extending the scope of recognition. The Public Consultation feedback will be made publicly available after the GSSI Steering Board’s decision.

Fish 2.0’s Global Innovators Forum honors cutting-edge developments, from robotic fish to barley-based feed

November 8, 2019 — At Fish 2.0’s Global Innovators Forum, the top innovators in six categories spanned the seafood industry, from packaging materials to blockchain.

Among the featured creations this year were: A fish transport box that replaces polystyrene containers; a barley-based fish feed; an antibiotic-free crayfish hatchery; a robotic fish outfitted with sensors to monitor offshore fish farms; an online B2B wholesale marketplace; and a blockchain-based traceability solution.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Lerøy testing project to detect salmon health with implanted sensors

November 7, 2019 — Farmed salmon company Lerøy Seafood Group has launched a pilot project in Norway that would attach sensors directly to the bodies of salmon in cages, then use an underwater wireless network to capture data in real time from the sensors about fish behavior and transmit it to farm managers on the water’s surface.

The technology would be a major advance from current monitoring systems, which can’t directly measure fish health in the water, and would give salmon farmers the kind of detailed information about the fish in their cages that so far has eluded them.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

First offshore aquaculture farm proposed for Gulf of Mexico

November 6, 2019 — A Hawaii-based fish farming company is proposing the first offshore aquaculture for the Gulf of Mexico, a pilot-scale project off Florida.

Kampachi Farms LLC proposed a single-net floating enclosure where up to 20,000 Almaco jack — yellowtail amberjack, also known as kampachi or kahala — would be reared about 45 miles west-southwest of Longboat Pass and Sarasota Bay.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency issued a draft permit in August and concluded a public comment at the end of September before issuing a final permit.

Kampachi Farms pioneered open-ocean fish culture off Hawaii, and the gulf venture could be the first in federal waters off the continental United States. The new project, dubbed Velella Epsilon, requires other permits from multiple federal agencies, including NMFS and the Corps of Engineers.

An interagency working group prepared a draft environmental assessment to look at potential environmental impacts of building and operating the fish farm. Commercial and recreational fishing advocates along with environmental activists are raising objections, saying introducing dense assemblages of non-native fish will harm the local ocean environment and the existing fishing industry.

Read the full story at National Fisherman

Aquaculture industry under pressure on both coasts

October 31, 2019 — Maquoit Bay in Brunswick and Puget Sound in Washington state are separated by thousands of miles, but shellfish farmers in both places are feeling some heat.

Earlier this month, a federal judge in Seattle ruled that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers permit that authorizes virtually all shellfish aquaculture in Washington state was void because “the Corps has failed to adequately consider the impacts of commercial shellfish aquaculture activities” as required by the federal Clean Water Act and the National Environmental Policy Act.

The court’s order could force Washington’s shellfish farmers to cease activities other than the harvest of animals already in the water until the Corps issues individual permits for each shellfish farming site.

For the moment, the court’s decision applies only to the Washington state aquaculture industry but, even if the court expands its reach, Maine’s aquaculture industry won’t be affected.

“It has no bearing in the rest of the country,” Jay Clement, chief of the Maine Project Office in the Corps of Engineers’ New England District Regulatory Division, said last week.

The permit the court considered was a “nationwide permit” authorizing discharges, structures and work related to commercial shellfish aquaculture activities.

“There have been no nationwide permits in New England since 1995,” Clement said. “It really doesn’t apply to how we do business in Maine.”

Read the full story at The Ellsworth American

Calls mount for salmon producers to step up to meet China’s growing appetite

October 29, 2019 — China’s exponentially increasing demand for salmon is likely to put a pinch on global supplies if the salmon-farming sector doesn’t find a way to increase production, according to Miguel Ugarte, the Asia sales director for Multiexport Foods Company, a leading supplier of Chilean salmon in China.

China has become the fastest-growing market for salmon in the world, with numbers indicating it has grown a whopping 166 percent in the last eight years, Urgarte said during the Global Aquaculture Alliance’s annual marketplace forum in Qingdao, China on Monday, 28 October.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

In wake of Canada election, report of BC net pen industry demise may be exaggerated

October 23, 2019 — Following the Justin Trudeau-led Liberal Party’s victory in Canada’s election Monday night, the Atlantic salmon aquaculture industry in the province of British Columbia (BC) might like to quote the celebrated American author Mark Twain.

“The report of my death was an exaggeration,” Twain quipped in 1879, at age 44, when cabled about rumors that persisted while he was traveling in London. He lived another 31 years.

The results are still being tallied but the Liberal Party seems poised to make several big changes to the Canadian seafood industry after taking a projected 157 of the legislature’s 338 seats, compared to the Progressive Conservative Party’s 121 seats, Bloc Quebecois’ 32 seats, National Democratic Party’s 24 seats and Green Party’s seven seats.

To pass any legislation in the House, the Liberals will need a full 170 votes, but many of the seafood-related pledges they made in their 85-page platform announced on Sept. 29 are a match with those made by the NDPs.

Read the full story at Undercurrent News

GSSI Public Consultation on the ASC Shrimp Standard Scope Extension

October 23, 2019 — The following was released by the Global Sustainable Seafood Initiative:

On 23 October 2019, GSSI launched a 30-day public consultation on the Interim GSSI Benchmark Report for the Aquaculture Stewardship Council (ASC) Shrimp Standard Scope Extension.

In early 2019, the ASC applied to extend the scope of its GSSI recognition to include its Shrimp Standard, having already obtained recognition for the scope of its Salmon Standard in August 2018.

GSSI now invites comments from all stakeholders on the recommendation of the Benchmark Committee to include the ASC Shrimp Standard in the GSSI scope of recognition for the ASC.

Read the full release here