England’s Dreaming
New aquaculture strategy should be market led not wishful thinking
The last issue of ‘Fish Farmer’ included the news that a new strategy had been launched to expand aquaculture in Eng land over the next 20 years. The strategy was commissioned by Seafood 2040 together with Seafish and the UK Government. The aim is to provide a pathway for growth of the aquaculture sector in the UK over the next two decades.
Whilst I am probably one of the staunchest supporters of aquaculture that anyone might find, I personally think that the development of an ‘English Aquaculture Strategy’ is a com plete waste of time. If England were to have a thriving aquaculture sector, I believe that it would have happened regardless of whether there was a strategy in place or not. I am sure that those proposing an English Strategy have seen that there is one for Scotland, but the Scottish Strategy was designed to build on a growing sector whereas in England, whatever aquaculture exists is essentially moribund. Of course, there are tweaks that can be made to enhance what aquaculture there is, and these might need changes in legislation, but such changes are not going to radically overhaul the existing sector.
Interestingly, I have heard similar views from the EU where officials argue that the aquaculture sector has not developed in the same way it has, for example, in Norway. There is good reason.
The problem for England and the EU is that there is too much com petition for space and resources and as a result most forms of aquacul ture are not really viable. An English Aquaculture Strategy is not going to change that. It could be argued that new technology will offer new opportunities. Closed contained recirculation systems appear to be all in vogue but they have yet to really demonstrate any commercial longevity. According to the latest wisdom, indoor salmon farms could be built on the edge of London to service local demand, but there is no proof that the capital’s consumers would be willing to pay for local ‘London’ salmon.
Interestingly, this is not the first English Aquaculture Strategy to be commissioned. In 2011, a consultation group was assembled including representatives from a wide range of interests. A report was put togeth er in 2012 but it was never published, although part of the consultation process was. I don’t know why the final strategy was never published but I can hazard a guess.
The draft report included some scenarios of future production in England. This vision consisted of producing 65,000 tonnes of marine fish in pump ashore raceways. The 65,000 tonnes of fish included 1,000 tonnes of turbot, 1,000 tonnes of sole, 1,000 tonnes of halibut, 6,000 tonnes of cobia, 6,000 tonnes of grouper, 10,000 tonnes of bream,
20,000 tonnes of bass and 20,000 tonnes of salmon.
It is hard to imagine why anyone would want to farm cobia and grouper in England when these species are not even part of the existing fish landscape. In the days when the predecessor to Seafish was involved in trialling farming, they did attempt to produce turbot in Scotland, but the know-how was transferred to Galicia in Spain where there was demand for the fish. The same team also tried to farm sole, but their attempts came to nothing. Halibut is farmed at Gigha in Scotland, but it is just one farm. Wresumably they would have expanded if it had been justified by the market. Bass is proving popular in the UK, but the volumes of imported fish fall well short of 20,000 tonnes. Finally, there seems little logic to farming salmon in pump ashore when many thousands of tonnes are produced north of the border. It seems very much as if a committee sat round and suggested species that might be grown followed by a guesstimate of what could be produced.
My own view was this strategy was flawed from the outset and this was because it was developed in response to possibilities of production. My view is that any strategy should be market-led. There’s no point producing a uaculture produce for which there is no market demand. tho exactly is going to buy grouper or cobia, when local fishermen can’t get UK consumers to buy fish like herring and pollock? According to the report in Fish Farmer, Seafish say that here is significant potential for the development of mussel, clam and scallop farming that is already established in the south west of England along with oyster farming but surely, these farms don’t need a strategy to expand. that they need is increased demand from the UK consumer and this is something that is very much in short supply.
It is hard to think of any species that could be farmed in England for which there is not only increasing consumer demand but also that has access to the right resources to help it grow. This is exactly why the existing English a uaculture industry has largely failed to develop beyond its current si e. I may well be wrong and therefore I am eagerly awaiting the publication of the new strategy later this year. I may yet have to eat my words..
“It’s hard to imagine why anyone would want to farm cobia and grouper England” in