OADC to ramp up finfish, shrimp farming capacity

Conrad Prabhu -
Muscat, JAN 21 -
Oman Aquaculture Development Company (OADC) — the wholly government-owned flagship of the Sultanate’s rapidly expanding aquaculture industry — is embarking on a significant expansion of its finfish and shrimp farming investments in the Sultanate of Oman.
OADC’s finfish farming investments are overseen by wholly-owned subsidiary Blue Waters LLC, which is being positioned to evolve into a major player in aquaculture farming. OADC’s equally ambitious shrimp farming business is driven by another subsidiary, Ocean Shrimp Aquaculture LLC.
Qurayat-based Blue Waters, which began operations in 2016 with the cultivation of sea-bream, is investing in new finfish farming capacity at key locations off the shoreline at Qurayat.
Blue Waters is installing 32 marine HDPE cages with a total capacity of 3,000 tonnes per annum. A further capacity addition of 3,000 tonnes per annum is envisioned at Dhabab where 32 marine HDPE cages will be deployed just off the coast.
To support these investments at the upstream end, Blue Waters is setting up a modern marine finfish hatchery at Al Bustan in Muscat Governorate. The modern hatchery will produce 15 million juveniles per year,
Blue Waters LLC, it may be recalled, represents one of OADC’s first investment initiatives that came in the wake of the Omani government’s efforts to jump-start the development of a flourishing aquaculture sector in the Sultanate. OADC itself a partnership between Oman Investment Fund (OIF), a sovereign wealth fund of the Sultanate of Oman, and the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries.
The Ministry’s strategy for the aquaculture industry envisions an output of 200,000 tonnes per annum of farmed fisheries by 2040, fuelled by strong growth averaging 15 per cent annually. Aquaculture has the potential to create a “profitable world-class sector that is ecologically sustainable and a net contributor to Oman’s economy”, according to the Ministry.
Furthermore, given its reputation as a public sector enterprise, Blue Waters LLC has been working closely with a number of prestigious local and international organisations to ensure that its farming, processing and packaging practices are in line with internationally accepted standards. This is being achieved through collaborations with the Aquaculture Centre of the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries, the Fisheries Control Centre of the Ministry, and the Marine and Fisheries Department of Sultan Qaboos University.
Additionally, a number of organisations from the marine finfish farming industry in the Mediterranean and MENA regions are also working closely with Blue Waters LLC in areas such as fish quality control, environmental protection and sustainability. While Blue Water’s investments are focused on the finfish farming segment of the aquaculture business, its sister subsidiaries are investing in shrimp farming activities.

Driving the development of a thriving shrimp farming sector is Oceanic Shrimp Aquaculture LLC, a holding company established under OADC with the mandate to attract investments in shrimp cultivation, processing, product development, branding and marketing — local and international.

Oceanic Shrimp Aquaculture plans to set up a shrimp farm at Khuwameh in Jaalan Bani Bu Ali. It centres on the development of a semi-integrated intensive shrimp farming project on a 200-hectare water surface area with a capacity to produce 3,400 tonnes of shrimp per year. The project is slated for completion in 2020.

Separately, Oceanic Shrimp Aquaculture plans to set up a shrimp farm off Qurun in Jaalan Bani Bu Hassan. Envisaged is a semi-integrated shrimp farm set on a 500-hectare water surface area with a capacity to produce 4,700 tonnes of shrimp per annum. The facility is due to come into production by 2020. Also on the anvil is a major a shrimp farm planned off Al Jazer in Al Wusta Governorate with a projected capacity of 24,000 tonnes per annum.

Side by side with its ambitious growth objectives, OADC is also making a significant contribution to employment generation as well. As many as 1,300 direct jobs have so far been created by investments promoted by Blue Waters and Oceanic Shrimp Aquaculture, the lion’s share of them coming from shrimp farming projects.