Seaweed nursery opens

Published date19 November 2020
AuthorLeah Tebbutt
Publication titleBay of Plenty Times
The latest addition to the University of Waikato’s Coastal Marine Field Station precinct at Sulphur Point was opened by the university’s Senior Deputy Vice-Chancellor Professor Alister Jones yesterday.

The precinct houses about 1000sq m of recirculating aquaculture and 24 algal tanks with a total cultivation volume of 60cu m, split between freshwater and marine systems.

Jones said the facility is the first in New Zealand to provide infrastructure for seaweed cultivation from nursery stages to grow-out and aims to deliver closed life-cycle aquaculture production of seaweed.

“The facility and algae produced here will form the basis of cutting-edge and interdisciplinary research. We think it is really about a sustainable diversification of New Zealand’s aquaculture industry and it provides a strong starting foundation point for the blue economy.”

The Cross Rd facility was funded by the Tertiary Education Commission’s Entrepreneurial Universities programme and the university through an algal biotechnology research project.

Jones said the facility provided an opportunity to create new courses in Tauranga unique to New Zealand.

Leading the algal biotechnology research project was seaweed biologist Dr Marie Magnusson.

Her objective was to...

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