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15th September 2021

Kerry Marine Biotech Company Wins Award for Seaweed-Based Crop Stimulant

Marine biotech company Brandon Bioscience has won an Enterprise Ireland award for a new product that draws extracts from common brown seaweed.

The extract can be used as a crop "bio-stimulant" in fertiliser, which has the potential to reduce chemical nitrogen input on farms by up to 20 per cent.

Brandon Bioscience is working with traditional fertiliser manufacturer Target Fertilisers on the product, which won this year's overall Enterprise Ireland Innovation Arena Award.

The awards for the most innovative Irish agritech and agri-engineering products were announced today by Minister of State for Business, Employment and Retail, Damien English.

The best overall start-up award has been given to Jennifer and Kevin Corley, founders of EquiTrace which is an app that works with a horse’s microchip to identify, locate and track individual animals as they move while also recording animal temperature and health records.

The awards are normally given at the National Ploughing Championships. This year’s competition was moved online due to the cancellation of the event as a result of the pandemic.

More than 50 entries were received for this year’s contest, with 28 selected for virtual pitching, according to Enterprise Ireland.

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22nd October 2016

New Roadmap For Marine Biotechnology Research & Innovation In Europe Is Launched

New Roadmap For Marine Biotechnology Research & Innovation In Europe Is Launched

#MarineScience - As previously highlighted on Afloat.ie, the Marine Biotechnology Research and Innovation Roadmap was launched by the EU-funded Marine Biotechnology Consortium (ERA-MBT) last week in Brussels.

The consortium brings together 19 partners from 14 countries across Europe to work with stakeholders in identifying marine biotechnological needs, and gaps in the value chain in an attempt to increase the valorisation of marine bioresources.

Developing a roadmap for future research and innovation was a key project deliverable, and it will now set the direction for future marine biotechnology developments and transnational activities in Europe.

Ireland's Marine Institute is a partner in ERA-MBT and led the development of the Marine Biotechnology Strategic Research and Innovation Roadmap. Chief executive Dr Peter Heffernan congratulated all those involved in the development of the roadmap, in particular Dr Dermot Hurst, who led the Marine Institute's contribution.

"The role played by the Marine Institute in supporting the development of Ireland's marine biotechnology research capabilities through funds awarded to the NutraMara and Beaufort Biodiscovery projects has placed Ireland in a strong international position as a recognised leader in marine biotechnology and related research,” said Dr Heffernan.

Today's bioeconomy is advancing faster and showing greater promise than ever before, driven by both scientific advances and markets demanding sustainable solutions to todays global grand challenges of food and fuel security, sustainable industry and population health.

The global market for marine biotechnology has the potential to reach €5.8 billion by 2025, and Europe is recognised as a high-potential region for future growth resulting from an extensive, yet largely unexplored marine resource.

The Marine Biotechnology Strategic Research and Innovation Roadmap, which is available to download HERE, has been developed to support the development of marine biotechnology research and innovation, enabling its growth within a self-sustained enterprise driven network. The roadmap provides a practical and realistic approach by which marine bioresources and biotechnology can contribute to economic and societal progress.

National and European policy organisations can use the roadmap in developing measures to maximise the contribution of the oceans’ bioresources to the bioeconomy and societal welfare, and funding agencies can use it to identify marine biotechnology related research themes.

Speaking from Ireland's perspective, Dr Heffernan added: "This roadmap directs attention to areas of research which are relevant to Ireland's enterprise sector and as such confirms the opportunities described by the Harnessing Our Ocean Wealth Development Task Force regarding marine resource-based industries adding value to their products and services through marine biotechnology."

Published in Marine Science
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20th September 2016

Registration Open For Stakeholder Meeting On Marine Biotech Roadmap

Coral reef in Florida

#MarineScience - The Marine Biotechnology ERA-NET will hold a stakeholder meeting, coinciding with the launch of the recently completed European Marine Biotechnology Research and Innovation Roadmap, on 12-14 October 2016 at the Hotel Marivaux in Brussels.

The stakeholder meeting builds on the key elements of the roadmap and will feature a wide range of speakers from international industry and the research community.

This event will run from 9am to 5pm on Thursday 13 October and from 9am to 1pm on Friday 14 October and comprises six sessions:

Session 1: Marine biotechnology, an industry perspective. With the aim of stimulating innovations based on the use of marine biotechnology to explore and maximise the use of marine bio-resources, speakers from different industry sectors will describe how they use a range of novel marine materials in commercial applications.

Session 2: Creating a marine biotechnology business. The challenges of building a business venture based on marine biotechnology are the focus of this session, which includes presentations on financing a new biotechnology enabled venture, managing knowledge transfer and intellectual property in addition to case studies presented by two marine biotechnology driven high-potential SMEs providing novel products to vastly different global markets.

Session 3: Supporting marine biotechnology RTDI. Leading industry practitioners will will give their perspectives on the future opportunities to develop new research tools and infrastructure; novel processes and applications in the health, food and food ingredients sectors.

Session 4: ERA-MBT and other EU supported marine biotechnology projects. Participants will learn of the impacts and outputs from some of Europe's major publicly funded marine biotechnology research projects and hear of the progress on projects funded by the first ERA-MBT call for research proposals.

Session 5 & 6: Future research opportunities and setting priorities. Highly interactive sessions will focus on mechanisms to support marine biotechnology and set priorities for marine biotechnology research and innovation.

The launch of the Marine Biotechnology Research and Innovation Roadmap will be held on Wednesday 12 October at 4pm followed by a networking cocktail at 6pm.

The roadmap highlights research and innovation as spanning scientific, technological, economic and societal challenges and sets a marine biotechnology research and innovation agenda to 2030.

It identifies five thematic areas; the first three enable exploration of the marine environment; support biomass production and processing; and contribute to product innovation and differentiation. Two other themes, policy support and stimulation; and the provision of enabling technologies and infrastructure; provide the foundation to support growth in the Blue Bioeconomy.

National and European policy organisations can use the roadmap in developing measures to maximise the contribution of the ocean's bio-resources to the bio-economy and societal welfare, and funding agencies can use it to identify marine biotechnology related research themes.

The stakeholder meeting and roadmap launch is open for all stakeholders and can be attended for free. The number of places is limited and will be allocated on the first come, firstserved basis. Participants are required to register before Monday 26 September.

For programme details, online registration and accommodation information, see the MarineBiotech website HERE.

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29th November 2013

Eight Marine Foods & Biotecholgy Projects to Receive €4.5m

Eight Marine Foods & Biotecholgy Projects to Receive €4.5m

#oceanwealth – Eight marine foods and marine biotechnology related projects will receive €4.5m from the Food Institutional Research Measure (FIRM) 2013.

Dr Peter Heffernan, CEO, Marine Institute welcomed the announcement by Simon Coveney, T.D., Minister for Agriculture Food and the Marine of the successful projects to be funded by the Food Institutional Research Measure (FIRM).

"I congratulate the successful applicants - these projects are led by expert Principal Investigators who are internationally ranked in their field. Their creative scientific ability, coupled with outstanding reputations, has been instrumental in building the type of collaboration required to engage in high-level research. It brings new research expertise to the marine sector, creates focused research teams and generates new research talent. With successes as these, and following recent successes for marine foods and marine biotechnology researchers in highly competitive SFI and EU research calls, Ireland is well positioned to play a significant role in Horizon 2020 research projects."

The projects address a range of research challenges facing the marine foods sector including enhancing the quality of ready-to-eat crabs and lobster products and applying novel processing technologies to extend the shelf-life of fish. Significant amongst the projects is the focus on the use of marine bio-resources as the basis for food-health products. This includes projects that seek to exploit Ireland's seaweed resource, targeting its use as a source of prebiotic ingredients for compounds that improve brain health; and exploiting the anti-inflammatory effects of seaweed compounds on bowel disease. These projects rely on bioactive compounds extracted from seaweeds, and a related project will investigate how to optimise the chemical composition of some species of seaweed to enhance the yield of bioactives.

The funding will generate knowledge that will be accessible to Irish firms seeking to generate greater value from marine bioresources in developing food and health related products. This support for enterprise driven research activity is a direct contribution to the goals of Harnessing Our Ocean Wealth – which aim to build a thriving maritime economy based on healthy marine ecosystems.

Ireland's seafood and fisheries sectors have high-growth potential and are critically important to the Irish economy. The seafood sector currently employs 11,000 people with annual sales of €700 million, the challenge of Food Harvest 2020 is to increase revenue to €1 billion and employment to 14,000 by 2020.

The potential for marine biotechnology research to contribute to the development of new seafood products and functional ingredients is recognised in Harnessing Our Ocean Wealth – An Integrated Marine Plan for Ireland. The importance of food and health research, and sustainable food production and processing research, in enabling economic growth and job creation was highlighted in Ireland's research prioritisation exercise.

The Marine Institute has supported marine research projects to the value of €42.6m since 2007 under the Sea Change Programme, funded by the National Development Plan 2007-2013. These funds contributed to building research capabilities and have attracted new research expertise to work on marine foods related research.

Projects such as the joint Marine Institute - FIRM funded NutraMara, the national marine functional foods research programme, are delivering high quality, industry relevant outputs. NutraMara has created a solid research platform and generated new research capacity that is being used to develop functional food ingredients from marine bio-resources. The strength of NutraMara is reflected in the new FIRM awards, with five of the projects being led by NutraMara Principal Investigators.

Published in Marine Science
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Aquaculture Information

Aquaculture is the farming of animals in the water and has been practised for centuries, with the monks farming fish in the middle ages. More recently the technology has progressed and the aquaculture sector is now producing in the region of 50 thousand tonnes annually and provides a valuable food product as well as much needed employment in many rural areas of Ireland.

A typical fish farm involves keeping fish in pens in the water column, caring for them and supplying them with food so they grow to market size. Or for shellfish, containing them in a specialised unit and allowing them to feed on natural plants and materials in the water column until they reach harvestable size. While farming fish has a lower carbon and water footprint to those of land animals, and a very efficient food fed to weight gain ratio compared to beef, pork or chicken, farming does require protein food sources and produces organic waste which is released into the surrounding waters. Finding sustainable food sources, and reducing the environmental impacts are key challenges facing the sector as it continues to grow.

Salmon is the most popular fish bought by Irish families. In Ireland, most of our salmon is farmed, and along with mussels and oysters, are the main farmed species in the country.

Aquaculture in Ireland

  • Fish and shellfish are farmed in 14 Irish coastal counties.
  • Irish SMEs and families grow salmon, oysters, mussels and other seafood
  • The sector is worth €150m at the farm gate – 80% in export earnings.
  • The industry sustains 1,833 direct jobs in remote rural areas – 80% in the west of Ireland
  • Every full-time job in aquaculture creates 2.27 other jobs locally (Teagasc 2015)
  • Ireland’s marine farms occupy 0.0004% of Ireland’s 17,500Km2 inshore area.
  • 83% of people in coastal areas support the development of fish farming
  • Aquaculture is a strong, sustainable and popular strategic asset for development and job creation (Foodwise 2025, National Strategic Plan, Seafood
  • Operational Programme 2020, FAO, European Commission, European Investment Bank, Harvesting Our Ocean Wealth, Silicon Republic, CEDRA)
    Ireland has led the world in organically certified farmed fish for over 30 years
  • Fish farm workers include people who have spent over two decades in the business to school-leavers intent on becoming third-generation farmers on their family sites.

Irish Aquaculture FAQs

Aquaculture, also known as aquafarming, is the farming of aquatic organisms such as fish, crustaceans, molluscs and aquatic plants, and involves cultivating freshwater and saltwater populations under controlled conditions- in contrast to commercial fishing, which is the harvesting of wild fish. Mariculture refers to aquaculture practiced in marine environments and in underwater habitats. Particular kinds of aquaculture include fish farming, shrimp farming, oyster farming, mariculture, algaculture (such as seaweed farming), and the cultivation of ornamental fish. Particular methods include aquaponics and integrated multi-trophic aquaculture, both of which integrate fish farming and plant farming.

About 580 aquatic species are currently farmed all over the world, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), which says it is "practised by both some of the poorest farmers in developing countries and by multinational companies".

Increasing global demand for protein through seafood is driving increasing demand for aquaculture, particularly given the pressures on certain commercially caught wild stocks of fish. The FAO says that "eating fish is part of the cultural tradition of many people and in terms of health benefits, it has an excellent nutritional profile, and "is a good source of protein, fatty acids, vitamins, minerals and essential micronutrients".

Aquaculture now accounts for 50 per cent of the world's fish consumed for food, and is the fastest-growing good sector.

China provides over 60 per cent of the world's farmed fish. In Europe, Norway and Scotland are leading producers of finfish, principally farmed salmon.

For farmed salmon, the feed conversion ratio, which is the measurement of how much feed it takes to produce the protein, is 1.1, as in one pound of feed producing one pound of protein, compared to rates of between 2.2 and 10 for beef, pork and chicken. However, scientists have also pointed out that certain farmed fish and shrimp requiring higher levels of protein and calories in feed compared to chickens, pigs, and cattle.

Tilapia farming which originated in the Middle East and Africa has now become the most profitable business in most countries. Tilapia has become the second most popular seafood after crab, due to which its farming is flourishing. It has entered the list of best selling species like shrimp and salmon.

There are 278 aquaculture production units in Ireland, according to Bord Iascaigh Mhara (BIM) *, producing 38,000 tonnes of finfish and shellfish in 2019 and with a total value of €172 million

There are currently almost 2,000 people directly employed in Irish aquaculture in the Republic, according to BIM.

BIM figures for 2019 recorded farmed salmon at almost 12,000 tonnes, valued at €110 million; rock oysters reached 10,300 tonnes at a value of €44 million; rope mussels at 10,600 tonnes were valued at €7 million; seabed cultured mussels at 4,600 tonnes were valued at €7 million; "other" finfish reached 600 tonnes, valued at €2 million and "other" shellfish reached 300 tonnes, valued at €2 million

Irish aquaculture products are exported to Europe, US and Asia, with salmon exported to France, Germany, Belgium and the US. Oysters are exported to France, with developing sales to markets in Hong Kong and China. France is Ireland's largest export for mussels, while there have been increased sales in the domestic and British markets.

The value of the Irish farmed finfish sector fell by five per cent in volume and seven per cent in value in 2019, mainly due to a fall on salmon production, but this was partially offset by a seven per cent increased in farmed shellfish to a value of 60 million euro. Delays in issuing State licenses have hampered further growth of the sector, according to industry representatives.

Fish and shellfish farmers must be licensed, and must comply with regulations and inspections conducted by the Sea Fisheries Protection Authority and the Marine Institute. Food labelling is a function of the Food Safety Authority of Ireland. There is a long backlog of license approvals in the finfish sector, while the Department of Agriculture, Food and Marine says it is working to reduce the backlog in the shellfish sector.

The department says it is working through the backlog, but notes that an application for a marine finfish aquaculture licence must be accompanied by either an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) or an Environmental Impact Assessment Report (EIAR). As of October 2020, over two-thirds of applications on hand had an EIS outstanding, it said.

The EU requires member states to have marine spatial plans by 2021, and Ireland has assigned responsibility to the Department of Housing, Planning and Local Government for the National Marine Planning Framework (NMPF). Legislation has been drawn up to underpin this, and to provide a "one stop shop" for marine planning, ranging from fish farms to offshore energy – as in Marine Planning and Development Management Bill. However, the Department of Agriculture, Food and Marine confirmed last year that it intends to retain responsibility for aquaculture and sea-fisheries related development – meaning fish and shellfish farmers won't be able to avail of the "one stop shop" for marine planning.

Fish and shellfish health is a challenge, with naturally occurring blooms, jellyfish and the risk of disease. There are also issues with a perception that the sector causes environmental problems.

The industry has been on a steep learning curve, particularly in finfish farming, since it was hailed as a new future for Irish coastal communities from the 1970s – with the State's Electricity Supply Board being an early pioneer, and tobacco company Carrolls also becoming involved for a time. Nutrient build up, which occurs when there is a high density of fish in one area, waste production and its impact on depleting oxygen in water, creating algal blooms and "dead zones", and farmers' use of antibiotics to prevent disease have all been concerns, and anglers have also been worried about the impact of escaped farmed salmon on wild fish populations. Sea lice from salmon farmers were also blamed for declines in sea trout and wild salmon in Irish estuaries and rivers.

BIM says over 95% of all salmon farmed in Ireland are certified organic. Organically grown salmon are only fed a diet of sustainable organic feed. They are also raised in more spacious pens than traditional farmed salmon. The need to site locations for fish farms further out to sea, using more robust cages for weather, has been recognised by regulatory agencies. There is a move towards land-based aquaculture in Norway to reduce impact on local ecosystems. The industry says that antibiotic use is declining, and it says that "safe and effective vaccinations have since been developed for farmed fish and are now widely used". Many countries are now adopting a more sustainable approach to removing sea lice from salmon, using feeder fish such as wrasse and lumpsucker fish. Ireland's first lumpsucker hatchery was opened in 2015.

BIM says over 95% of all salmon farmed in Ireland are certified organic. Organically grown salmon are only fed a diet of sustainable organic feed. They are also raised in more spacious pens than traditional farmed salmon. The need to site locations for fish farms further out to sea, using more robust cages for weather, has been recognised by regulatory agencies. There is a move towards land-based aquaculture in Norway to reduce impact on local ecosystems. The industry says that antibiotic use is declining, and it says that "safe and effective vaccinations have since been developed for farmed fish and are now widely used". Many countries are now adopting a more sustainable approach to removing sea lice from salmon, using feeder fish such as wrasse and lumpsucker fish. Ireland's first lumpsucker hatchery was opened in 2015.

Yes, as it is considered to have better potential for controlling environmental impacts, but it is expensive. As of October 2020, the department was handling over 20 land-based aquaculture applications.

The Irish Farmers' Association has represented fish and shellfish farmers for many years, with its chief executive Richie Flynn, who died in 2018, tirelessly championing the sector. His successor, Teresa Morrissey, is an equally forceful advocate, having worked previously in the Marine Institute in providing regulatory advice on fish health matters, scientific research on emerging aquatic diseases and management of the National Reference Laboratory for crustacean diseases.

BIM provides training in the national vocational certificate in aquaculture at its National Fisheries College, Castletownbere, Co Cork. It also trains divers to work in the industry. The Institute of Technology Carlow has also developed a higher diploma in aqua business at its campus in Wexford, in collaboration with BIM and IFA Aquaculture, the representative association for fish and shellfish farming.

© Afloat 2020

At A Glance - Irish Aquaculture

  • Fish and shellfish are farmed in 14 Irish coastal counties
  • Salmon is the most popular fish bought by Irish families. 
  • In Ireland, most of our salmon is farmed, and along with mussels and oysters, are the main farmed species in the country.
  • The industry sustains 1,833 direct jobs in remote rural areas – 80% in the west of Ireland
  • Every full-time job in aquaculture creates 2.27 other jobs locally (Teagasc 2015)
  • Ireland’s marine farms occupy 0.0004% of Ireland’s 17,500Km2 inshore area.
  • 83% of people in coastal areas support the development of fish farming

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