AKVA unveils Indian aquaculture partnership
One of India’s leading aquaculture companies, Mumbai-based West Coast Group, has joined forces with the AKVA group to mechanise farm facilities across subcontinental developing nations.
The two companies signed an exclusive distribution and partnering agreement to develop modern aquaculture technology in the region.
Trond Severinsen, AKVA group’s Senior Vice President – Technology and Development, said: “We are very proud that India’s leading aquaculture company has decided to partner with us to develop the market for our technology in India. Although most of our business has been, and still is, in the salmon industry, our technology has been exported to more than 65 countries and for a wide variety of species for many decades."
Modular cages
Severinsen added: “In order to meet the needs of aquaculture in India and around, we are both adapting existing products and inventing brand new ones. This includes our new MC-250 Modular Cage concept that is tailor-made for tilapia farming in lakes, rivers and sheltered marine sites.
“But to succeed in India we also need to offer the right quality at the right price. In order to do this, we will manufacture and supply components both from Norway and India, including highly efficient robot-manufactured cage brackets from Norway, which is a key component of the cages.
“We also see there is a good potential to mechanize the feeding processes in India’s shrimp farming sector, using our Akvasmart Central Feed Systems. Such innovation will help reduce production costs and improve growth and farming performance for farmers in India, as it has for salmon and finfish in other markets.”
Opportunities to adapt
“After two decades of helping the shrimp farmers, we are now adding new-age solutions in our offerings through our AquaMart business unit, for both the fish and shrimp sectors,” said Rahul Kulkarni, board director of West Coast and CEO of AquaMart. “We are quite excited to announce that we are entering into this partnership with the world’s leading aquaculture technology company, AKVA group. Norway and salmon are of course very different from India, but we see great opportunities to adapt many products and solutions to our local needs of developing countries, across species. In time, India will also develop its offshore marine farming, using the Norwegian model with large scale cages and feed barges, and this is also very much in our plans in India, sooner than later.”
West Coast Group has been involved in fish farming, processing, exports and distribution of seafood for more than 20 years. The company has 500 staff and is based out of Mumbai, with representatives across India and in the USA, Europe and Middle East.
