The company is researching its first steps to using submersible tech to farm salmon in the Cook Strait.
The country’s largest salmon-farming company is launching a research project in Cook Strait which lies in the North and South Islands of New Zealand, ahead of installing submersible salmon farms according to stuff.co.
The publication reported that “New Zealand King Salmon made a resource consent application to use 1792 hectares of water, 4.7 nautical miles north of Cape Lambert in the Marlborough Sounds.”
The project is now in its research stage only – supported by the scientific bodies, Cawthron Institute and Blue Planet Marine – and will monitor the area using the equipment to measure how rough the conditions are, and how marine mammals pass through the area.
Chief executive Grant Rosewarne said that the research project was the first step towards submersible salmon farms in Cook Strait, but would take at least year.
In July, Mr Rosewarne estimated 100 extra pens in Cook Strait, over 80ha, could lift the company’s annual revenue from $136 million to $2.5 billion.
“Our objective is to find three areas, or ideally six, where we can put one farm in each … That’s just best practice with biosecurity to have them further away.
“But, put it this way, one farm would produce 10,000 tonnes of salmon so that would obviously keep us going for a while” he told the publication.
The company plans on using tech from Norway, which used to harsher conditions.
