national geographics on fish farming
http://www.nationalgeographic.com/foodfeatures/aquaculture/
March 31, 2014, 3:06 pm
Jeanine Stewart
When the California Coastal Commission unanimously approved Catalina Sea Ranch’s application for a 100 acre shellfish farm in January, it gave one of the few shows of support from US state government in recent history and what some believe to be a positive litmus test for the future of aquaculture in the United States.
Projected to produce 2.6 million pounds of mussels a year, it is ten miles from an expensive slab of real estate – California’s Huntington Beach – is prime territory for a “NIMBY” uproar. NIMBYism (“not in my backyard”, an urban dictionary creation describing public outcries against block development proposals from neighboring residents) has long been known to put obstacles in the way of aquaculture projects’ permitting approval processes.
Yet Catalina Sea Ranch CEO Phil Cruver says there was no such uproar for his Mediterranean mussel farm, which he hopes to begin this summer. It likely did not hurt that he positioned the project smartly out of residents’ sight, at 10 miles offshore.
As for squelching possible objections from the environmental community, Cruver and the other five members of his management team turned to scientists to validate the intensive environmental planning he had done before taking the project through the applications project. Their support was overwhelming.
“Fifteen of the top shellfish scientists across the globe wrote letters of support stating this will have no negative impact on California waters,” Cruver told Undercurrent News. “There are at least 20 PhDs involved with this project who have experience and credentials in marine ecology and spatial planning. Any impact, based upon independent and transparent science-based data, will be incorporated into our adaptive management plan for the advancement of offshore shellfish mariculture.”
Mussels, being bivalves, filter the water as they eat and require no extra food be put in the water, avoiding the negative press salmon farms get from environmental groups on account of fish waste.
Now, Catalina Sea Ranch CEO Phil Cruver is scouting for the final $3 million he needs to start the project this summer, citing “lots of interest” in a fundraising cycle that ends in April. With a history in successful startups, being co-founder of offshore aquaculture project KZO Sea Farms and former chairman of the software company KZO Innovations, he is going after the remaining funding needed via multiple channels.
The company recently submitted an application for two $250,000 grants. The first is for its offshore monitoring program with partners Lockheed Martin, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), Scripps Oceanographic Institute, Wrigley Institute of Environmental Studies, and the Marine Biological Laboratory at Woods Hole.
The second is for its selective breeding program with University of California and California State University, Long Beach, from NOAA’s Sea Grant Aquaculture program. These grants, if awarded, require 50% matching funds from Catalina Sea Ranch.
Multiple industry players, including Fortune Fish CEO Sean O’Scannlain, a major advocate of the potential of US aquaculture, have already donated and issued statements of support for the project.
Funds would go to buying anchors, installing them, completing the nursery, completing the hatchery and paying off a 75-foot research vessel, named Captain Jack (pictured), which the company attained at a deep discount from the former owner.
Business strategy leads hopes for US industry progress
The mission of Catalina Sea Ranch and its investors is simple: to make money for investors while creating a US source of fresh shellfish, Cruver said.
Helping to ensure strong returns is the company’s species selection – the Mediterranean mussel, a larger, faster growing and a higher meat content mussel than the common blue mussel, which are projected to sell for $1.50 per pound, farmgate.
In addition, Cruver has hopes to launch cultivation of the purple hinge rock scallop, a highly prized product.
“Now instead of $1.50 a pound, you’re talking $8 to $10 a pound,” Cruver said of the scallop.
Marketing plans will focus on the sustainability and nutrition of the products.
“I think once people learn the nutritional value of mussels with the high omega threes, it will take off,” he said, “and we hope to market it as a USDA organic product once the organic standards are released, which we understand will be later this year.”
Institutions specializing in marine ecology and special planning, such as the Wrigley Institute for Environmental Studies and the Scripps Institution for Oceanography, will monitor the project; and Lockheed Martin will provide technical consultation and remote sensing data analyses.
Yet as focused as Cruver is on having a successful business, he is also willing to help his competitors advance their own technologies, he said.
“The data that we collect – we’re not going to hoard it – we’re going to make itransparently and globally available on the Internet ‘cloud’ so that scientists and fishery management officials from across the globe can benefit from our pioneering project,” Cruver said,” Cruver said.
Considering the US imported 33 million pounds of mussels from Canada alone in 2013 and a total of 71 million from all countries, the 2.7 million pounds of mussel supply per year won’t displace outside US sourcing needs, but Cruver emphasizes that it is a step in that direction.
The project’s easy approval process could certainly serve as an inspiring example to the US aquaculture industry, which has had its share of horror stories in the past. In at least one case, a company lost half a million dollars in pursuit of permitting approval that never happened.
Ultimately, Cruver sees this project as one step in a direction that authorities of many kinds have cited. He points to the World Bank’s recent report that by 2030, aquaculture will provide close to two thirds of the global food consumption and a quote by Nobel Laureate Peter Drucker, who said, “Aquaculture, not the Internet, represents the most promising investment opportunity of the 21st century”
Cartagena Marine Cluster / yook3
