Features

The waters surrounding Isla Margarita, off the Caribbean coast of Venezuela, have become Latin America’s most productive seaweed farming region, largely thanks to three young enterprises, which are empowering smallholder farmers by providing a route to market.…

By satisfying the requirements of three key pillars of site selection, seaweed farmers will have a much better chance of achieving long-term commercial viability. 

Alam Panchayat swapped a career as an urban chef with a chance to set up his own carp farm in Barguna, on the coast of Bangladesh, slowly growing a successful business, despite the challenges posed by extreme weather. 

Changing pond management and feeding strategies are the best way to limit shrimp disease – with those farmers who focus on reducing stress and improving pond health the ones who are consistently succeeding, according to Robins McIntosh. 

Kelp farming startup WildBlue Mariculture was founded by commercial fishers Amber Morris and Kory Blake in a bid to both diversify their incomes and have a positive impact on the planet. 

Through community-led aquaculture, Indonesia’s Kampung Patin (Pangasius Village) has grown into a model of resilience – creating jobs across the value chain and proving that fish farming can lift an entire community out of poverty.

Ocean Fields Connection (OFC), a partnership of impact-oriented seaweed SMEs such as Ocean Farmers and Nosy Boraha Seaweed, works with more than 3,000 smallholder households across 50 coastal villages in Madagascar to produce, and find markets for, tens of tho…

Samaking is a Kenyan tilapia logistics and aggregation network that's growing an impressive pace, currently sourcing up to 300 tonnes of fish a month.

Lorena Gamez, manager of El Pasito Afro-Agricultural and Tourism Association (ASOPASITO), aims to support and strengthen communities of both indigenous and African descent in Cesar, Colombia, through sustainable fish farming and rural community tourism. 

South Korea’s olive flounder farming sector may have failed to reach the dizzy heights predicted by industry experts 10 years ago, but there are signs that it could yet deliver on its previous promise. 

Thea Thomas and her partner Cale Hershcleb have blazed a trail for seaweed farming in Prince William Sound, having been operational for four seasons as the Royal Ocean Kelp Co. 

From co-designing with farmers, to battle-testing at sea, to building for the next frontier, Seapa says it is trying to redefine what’s possible for oyster growers worldwide.

Ecocean’s technique of capturing, ranching and then releasing wild fish offers an alternative to traditional aquaculture – enhancing rather than exploiting marine ecosystems – but can it be made to pay?

Walking through the halls at AquaNor this year reinforced how diverse and ambitious innovation in aquaculture has become: from advanced feeding systems and real-time environmental monitoring to next-generation farming solutions, it was impossible not to notice…

Fabiane Almeida, founder of Aqua Viridi, is convinced that producing Amazonian algae can help tackle environmental challenges, increase food production and create employment opportunities in the heart of the rainforest.

Pure Algae’s bioremediation technology is designed to turn excess emissions into a financially attractive proposition for recirculating aquaculture system (RAS) farms. With several setups operational in labs and production containers across Europe, the company…

Combining scientific curiosity and practical grit, Olivia Duner and Jonny Antoni - with the support of several friends - set up Sea Quester Farms in 2022 in a bid to establish a regenerative aquaculture operation in Bear Creek, near Juneau. 

An Irish startup is developing ceramic membrane systems to deliver efficient, high-purity oxygen directly on site to aquaculture facilities.

Applications are open for GreenWave’s Kelp CoLab, a new programme designed to develop beauty and personal care products that contain farmed kelp, in a bid to boost market demand and strengthen the seaweed industry.   

While the struggles of most of the world’s flagship salmon RAS growout projects are well known, Danish Salmon has been generating profits for two consecutive years, suggesting that there might be a future for a sector that has largely failed to live up to the …

FP Aquaculture & Ocean Health is developing an all-in-one tool to help salmon farmers detect small but destructive biological threats before they strike.

Dr Moussa Sène has established a pioneering integrated farm in Senegal, producing catfish, tilapia and a selection of livestock, while also helping train up a new generation of fish farmers. 

Working with one of North America’s largest seaweed processors on one side, and a range of Alaska’s fledgling seaweed farmers on the other, Mothers of Millions is ensuring that growers have a market, while processors have a reliable supply. 

The handling and transfer of fish to different sites for ongrowing are critical steps in the aquaculture production cycle. If not properly managed, the transportation process can cause severe stress and physical damage, with significant long-term impacts on gr…

After 12 months in which a number of the West’s flagship indoor shrimp farms have been forced to shut down, two of the more promising remaining companies explain how they have not only survived the turmoil, but also have plans to expand. 

Patient capital can transform the blue economy – and save the ocean – according to the head of Africa’s largest ocean-impact catalyst.

Carolina Muñoz and José Avilés have been cultivating seaweed for over two decades in Bahía Inglesa, northern Chile. While production was initially their main focus, they are currently spending more time investigating ways to add value to their crops.

Janno van der Laan is the founder of Nasaru Naturals, a startup cultivating spirulina in the soda lakes of East Africa’s Rift Valley, as a sustainable protein source for both human nutrition and aquafeeds.

In Normandy, oysters reign supreme, but a new land-based ulva producer, Magma Seaweed, hopes to disrupt the tides with a novel two-pronged farming approach. 

By combining ocean intelligence with training and buy-back schemes, MarinElixirs is de-risking cultivation, integrating the value chain and turning fresh seaweed into higher-value biostimulants within hours of harvesting.

Disease management is one of the most persistent challenges in aquaculture and the solutions often come at a cost to both the environment and the fish themselves. But one company, Sundew, believes it’s found a game-changing natural alternative to formalin for …

The ocean already holds trillions of tonnes of carbon dioxide, and Vycarb, led by a scientist who swapped academia for entrepreneurship, wants to leverage that storage for industrial applications.

The opportunities presented by smarter tools that can solve ongoing problems on shrimp farms are set to be the topic in a new session at this year’s Global Shrimp Forum.

Fairouz Abbassi is the hatchery manager at Aquaculture Tunisienne, the largest sea bass and sea bream hatchery in North Africa, with an annual production of up to 30 million juveniles.

José Pablo Puga, co-founder and CEO of ChucaoTech, pioneered the use of nanobubbles to tackle seabed pollution beneath salmon farms, but has since expanded into other applications and species. 

Scientists from Norway and Australia are approaching the sea lice problem differently, arguing that it is essential to have an in-depth understanding of their biology and behaviour in order to manage them properly.

On a small, remote atoll in French Polynesia – surrounded by thousands of kilometers of open ocean – Kamoka Pearl is using innovative techniques to farm oysters in harmony with the reef.

Massive blooms of sargassum seaweed are choking Caribbean coastlines – threatening marine life, deterring tourism and damaging coastal economies – but where others see a threat, SOS Biotech is already turning the invasive species into valuable products.

Few innovations could have the same transformative potential for aquaculture as marine-adapted tilapia, a new strain of which is now poised for commercial launch in Vietnam. 

Spanning nearly all the continents, the International Biology and Macroalgae Center (IBMC) hopes to use knowledge sharing between key seaweed producers to supercharge this ocean crop and make it a viable commodity on the global market.