The RAS industry is not for the faint of heart. The purpose of this “Lessons learned” keynote is to identify those challenges we are facing right now and sharing experiences of how to solve these problems. At RASTECH 2023, we wanted to talk about the mistakes and the setbacks, but always in the spirit of learning how to progress and develop from them.

Panelists:

• Damien Claire, chief sales and marketing officer at Atlantic Sapphire
• Per Heggelund, founder of AquaSeed, Sweet Spring Salmon and now, Andfjord Salmon
• Justin Henry, owner of Henry Aquaculture Consult and aquaculture business director at University of British Columbia
• Sylvia Wulf, president and chief executive of AquaBounty Technologies

Rodrigo Mezerhane is the senior project manager at Blue Star Foods in the United States and his latest project is an interesting venture into a unique species in a recirculating aquaculture system (RAS). Atlantic blue crabs are cannibalistic which makes juvenile survival rates in captivity very low. This project’s solution is to capture Atlantic blue crabs from local fishermen and raise the stock through its late molting stage, instead of raising it in land from its early stages. But this doesn’t mean the species still doesn’t come with challenges. Rodrigo shares the meticulous challenge of establishing good Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) in order for the facility to raise the blue crabs to be ready and harvested for consumers.

Guest: Rodrigo Mezerhane

After cultivating his genomics expertise in the United States and in Norway, Woo-Jai Lee returns to his homeland in South Korea to start an olive flounder RAS project in Goheung. Raising olive flounder, a.k.a. Japanese halibut, in a recirculating aquaculture system has its unique challenges. BluGen founder & CEO Woo-Jai shares the challenges and innovations of building a 1,700 MT/year facility for this flatfish marine species.

Guest: Woo-Jai Lee

More commercial-size RAS projects are propping up in Japan. In this episode, we get an inside look at one of the largest projects with Dharma Rajeswaran, chief operations officer at Proximar Seafood. He shares about his long history in salmon farming, from traditional net pens in Norway to recirculating aquaculture in Atlantic Sapphire.

Guest: Dharma Rajeswaran

It truly takes a village to raise the next generation of recirculating aquaculture farmers. Kevin Hoffman is the instructor and program manager for Onalaska High School’s aquaculture program in Washington State, United States. Through his hands-on program, students learn many practical skills, including feeding, sampling, fish husbandry, construction and maintenance. In this episode, Kevin shares how he grew this program to what it is today and how others can do the same.

Guest: Kevin Hoffman

Last July, Kingfish Maine was forced to go head-to-head against an anti-aquaculture group that wanted to put a stop to all aquaculture development in Jonesport, Maine. The aquaculture moratorium was put to a vote and local residents rejected the proposal 201 to 91. Now that the road is clear for the company to begin construction, Dianna Fletcher, communications consultant, shares how the company earned its social license through targeted public relations strategies.

Guest: Dianna Fletcher

When the island country of Singapore imports more than 90 per cent of its food supply, this new RAS project hopes to be a local solution. Esben Johnsen is the chief executive officer of Singapore RAS. Coming from Norway’s oil and gas industry, he understands the power and possibilities of land-based aquaculture.

Guest: Esben Johnsen

Atlantic Sapphire CEO Johan Andreassen called 2021 the company’s “annus horribilis.” From losing the chillers in Miami to the devastating fire in Denmark, Atlantic Sapphire made headlines for mass mortalities caused by a chain of unfortunate events. In this episode, Andreassen talks to our co-hosts, Jean Ko Din and Brian Vinci, about lessons learned from last year and how the company plans to move forward in transforming the industry’s future.

Guest: Johan Andreassen

Vismar Aqua is a Ukrainian RAS design firm that built the largest RAS shrimp farm in Europe, Merman’s House. When Russia’s invasion forced the farm to close after only four months in operation, the company decided to donate its first batches of shrimp to the Ukrainian army. Founder and chief technology officer, Lubomir Haidamaka, sits down with co-hosts, Jean Ko Din and Brian Vinci, to share his story from his office in Kyiv, Ukraine.

Guest: Lubomir Haidamaka

Aquaponics is often described as the combination of recirculating aquaculture with hydroponics. Many favour it as the ultimate circular food production system, utilizing waste from the production of fish to be used as nutrients for the production of plants like leafy greens and tomatoes. In our world today, the aquaponics model is still appealing and is an example of the circular food systems that we’ll need for a sustainable future.

Currently, there are a few moderate to large aquaponics operations running in the U.S.: Superior Fresh in Wisconsin, Springworks Farm in Maine, and Traders Hill Farm in Florida. In this episode of RAS Talk, co-host Brian Vinci, director of the Conservation Fund’s Freshwater Institute, sat down to talk all things aquaponics with Tracy Nazzaro, principal and president for Traders Hill Farm.

Guest: Tracy Nazzaro

Past RAS Talk episodes have had a particular focus on various salmon and trout species because they’re known to be some of the more ‘established’ aquaculture species in Europe and North America. However, globally, barramundi, also known as Asian sea bass, is an aquaculture-established species. Production is especially established in Australia, where MainStream Aquaculture, said to have the largest warm water aquaculture farm of its type and is also the largest Barramundi fingerling supplier in Australia and the world, has its five facilities. In the final RAS Talk episode of 2021, Dr. Paul Harrison, co-founder and chief scientist at MainStream Aquaculture gives listeners a peak into the aquaculture industry in Australia and MainStream Aquaculture’s operations.

Guest: Dr. Paul Harrison

Looking to raise awareness and educate Americans on the benefits of regularly eating seafood to achieve a healthier diet, as well as advocate for the recirculating aquaculture systems (RAS) sector and aquaculture industry to achieve an overall more environmentally-friendly and sustainable seafood industry, Linda Cornish, Founder and President of the Seafood Nutrition Partnership (SNP), sat down with hosts Catarina Muia and Brian Vinci for this episode of RAS Talk. Linda discussed the important goals the SNP is looking to achieve, and how the RAS sector and aquaculture industries can help achieve these goals.

Guest: Linda Cornish

Public fish hatcheries have a long history in North America, with many culture methods and innovations used in today’s commercial aquaculture industry, first developed at public fish hatcheries. This includes water reuse. While water reuse was initially very basic, as the understanding of fish biology and water quality increased, so did the ways in which water was treated for reuse. Some of the first water reuse systems that included a biofilter and oxygenation, were built at public fish hatcheries. These basic RAS were predecessors to the intensive RAS used in today’s commercial operations.

There are a good number of water reuse systems and intensive RAS at public fish hatcheries today, but few public fish hatchery programs have adopted intensive RAS like the Alaska Department of Fish and Game. During this episode of RAS Talk, Alaska Department of Fish and Game’s Jeff Milton, Sport Fish Hatchery program supervisor, and Travis Hyer, Ruth Burnett Sport Fish Hatchery manager, give us some insight on how their public hatcheries have successfully moved toward RAS.

Guests: Jeff Milton and Travis Hyer

The RAS-produced Atlantic salmon sector has come a long way since its inception in the late 1990s, with the industry has continuously striving for success. However, it took time to get the technology there, with RAS technological components evolving greatly in the past 20-23 years. Today, we continue to improve technology and RAS facilities to produce high-quality Atlantic salmon, but must look at the biology of Atlantic salmon as well, focusing on genetic improvements to the eggs to create quality stock, as well as avoid diseases, mass mortalities, and early maturation. In this episode of RAS Talk, co-hosts Catarina Muia and Brian Vinci speak with Dr. Jónas Jónasson, Production Director at BMK Genetics & CEO at Benchmark Genetics Iceland, and Christopher Good, Director of Research at the Conservation Fund Freshwater Institute, to see how the industry is prioritizing and moving forward with the improvements of Atlantic salmon genetics.

With much talk, research and new projects circulating the land-based shrimp production sector, RAS Talk was curious to gain perspective from a shrimp recirculating aquaculture system (RAS) professional. Patrick Wood, global consultant and expert on shrimp production technology and innovation, sat down with RAS Talk hosts Catarina Muia and Brian Vinci, to discuss the current technologies being utilized in the land-based shrimp production sector including RAS technologies, the necessary areas of improvement in RAS for shrimp production, where the land-based shrimp production industry is headed, and more.

This week, RAS Talk host Brian Vinci had the opportunity to speak with Yonathan Zohar, Professor and Chair of the Department of Marine Biotechnology at the Institute of Marine and Environmental Technology (IMET), University of Maryland, Baltimore County and Director, Aquaculture Research Center at IMET, as well as Program Leader of Recirculating Aquaculture Salmon Network (RAS-N). With more than 40 years in the marine biology industry, Yonathan discusses the use and combination of biotechnology with RAStech, the importance of project RAS-N and its potential outcomes, as well as the projects he and his team have had the opportunity to work on, at IMET.

In this episode, hosts Mari-Len De Guzman and Brian Vinci talk with Árni Páll Einarsson, CEO of Matorka, a pioneer in land-based production of arctic char based in Grindavik, Iceland. Einarsson talks about his company’s journey through its RAS production and the opportunities for sustainable seafood production in Iceland.

Guest: Árni Páll Einarsson, CEO, Matorka

Bridging the gap between seafood producers and consumers is key to pushing the agenda of sustainability in the aquaculture industry. In this episode, hosts Brian Vinci and Mari-Len De Guzman speak with sustainable seafood advocate Jennifer Bushman about some of the practical and meaningful ways seafood producers can engage their consumers.

Guest: Jennifer Bushman, sustainable seafood advocate and educator