Aquaculture
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Industry Overview
The US aquaculture industry includes about 4,000 farms with combined annual revenue of $1 billion. No major companies dominate; the average annual revenue per farm is $250,000. The industry is fragmented: the top 200 farms generate 60 percent of industry revenue.
Aquaculture is the farm-raising of fish, shellfish, and other aquatic animals. Unlike wild-caught fish and shellfish, aquaculture farms raise animals in captivity, stock and feed animals, and protect stock from predators. Commercial fishing in natural aquatic habitats isn't included in this industry, nor are fish processors or packers.
Competitive Landscape
Demand is driven primarily by domestic trends in fish consumption and competition from imports. The profitability of individual companies depends on efficient operations and protecting fish stock from death and disease. Large companies have advantages in vertically integrating operations from breeding to processing and packaging. Small farms, typically those that are family-owned, can compete effectively by specializing in unusual and high-end products or offering onsite fee-fishing. The industry is labor-intensive: average annual revenue per worker is around $70,000.
Aquaculture competes against livestock, poultry, and traditional fishing operations. Americans consume 6 billion pounds of seafood annually. Around 40 percent is foreign; only 8 percent is domestic.
Products, Operations & Technology
Major products include catfish (40 percent of farms); mollusks, such as clams and oysters (20 percent); and trout (10 percent). Other products include freshwater shrimp, salmon, ornamental tropical fish, and baitfish. Some farms specialize in fee-fishing, allowing fishing enthusiasts to catch and pay for pond-caught fish.
Farm-raised catfish are grown in open freshwater production systems, typically earthen ponds fed by groundwater. Salmon are hatched in fresh water and transferred to saltwater pens for final growout. Mollusk aquaculture is carried out in coastal waters spread over prepared, shallow coastal water beds (bottom culture) or in production systems bound to ropes and suspended from rafts or floats (off-bottom culture).
In a typical aquaculture farm, brooding fish (broodstock) spawn in open ponds. Each female lays 2,000 to 5,000 eggs, depending on the type of fish. Fertilized eggs are collected and moved to a hatchery. Eggs hatch within a week of incubation at temperatures around 80 degrees. Small fish (fry) are transferred to a nursery pond and mature into small fingerlings, which are fed floating food pellets and either sold or transferred to a growout pond once they weigh 40 to 80 pounds per thousand fish.
At the growout pond, fingerlings are fed daily, maturing into stocker fish weighing anywhere from 60 to 750 pounds per thousand fish. At harvest, fish are transferred to an on- or off-site processing and packaging facility. Catfish are foodsize at one to two pounds live weight, trout at one pound live weight, and salmon at eight to 10 pounds.
It takes 18 to 36 months for an egg to develop into a foodsize fish. Harvest times depend on temperature, breeding efficiency, and the density of fish stocks in a fingerling and foodsize production pond.
Major aquaculture inputs include water; soybean and fish meal; chemicals to balance pH, oxygen, and carbon dioxide levels; medications such as antibiotics; and electricity to heat ponds. Stocker and foodsize fish require a daily feed of around 5 percent of total body weight. Catfish require around two pounds of feed to produce one pound of live weight fish. It can take up to 10 pounds of wild fish to produce one pound of farm-raised salmon.
One of the most important technical innovations in the aquaculture industry has been the widespread adoption of electric paddle wheel aeration. Aeration has improved breeding yields and reduced death and disease. Improvements in completely closed systems have better isolated farmed fish from predators and wild species, minimizing the risk of cross-breeding. Aquafeed suppliers have made significant advances in combining and optimizing feed ingredients into very small pellets. Advancements in aquaculture vaccinations have further reduced disease and animal morbidity.