This article is published as a part of a partnership with Future Food Asia. Aqua Development is one of the 11 finalists of the US$100,000 Future Food Asia (FFA) 2020 Award to be hosted from September 21-25.
Asia is home to some of the largest shrimp producers and consumers in the world. Production in Asia is dominated by intensive farms of varying sizes, which produce multiple crops of shrimp every year, with a fair share of them destined to be exported overseas.
In such conditions, food safety, biosecurity, and sustainability concerns are overwhelming, as antibiotics are frequently used to prevent disease outbreaks, and significant waste is produced from frequent water exchange. This is often inevitable, not only due to poor management but also a higher likelihood of contamination and disease outbreaks in intensive conditions.
Enter aquamimicry – a system that mimics and reproduces natural ocean conditions inside the ponds. Aqua Development, based in South Korea, derives its technology from aquamimicry to reproduce the most critical elements of the natural ecosystem inside their farm.
Nature is the world’s best teacher
Co-Founder Othman has derived inspiration from nature, which has for billions of years refined, optimised, and fine-tuned its processes, balances, and systems. Humanity has managed to understand some of them, but many still remain undiscovered or not fully understood. He thus believes that mimicking natural processes and balances is key to achieving great performance in aquaculture.
Classical aquaculture, such as RAS (recirculating aquaculture system), tends to eliminate any organisms and factors aside from the cultured species, placing the emphasis on crop specialisation to gain yield.
This eliminates the symbiotic dynamics between the cultured species and its natural environment, many of which are extremely important yet not fully understood. As a result, RAS often displays unexplained issues such as slow growth, animal fragility, short longevity, and strange smell and flavour.
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Aqua Development tries to do the opposite by introducing natural factors into their pond ecosystem as possible, with particular attention to the micro-ecosystem. The entire ecosystem ensures that the shrimp stay alive and thrive by improving shrimp health and immunity, thus obviating the need for antibiotics, further chemicals, and additional food source.
This demonstrates a younger school of thought that considers biodiversity to be an asset, which eventually can positively impact yield.
Slowly but surely…
Othman strongly believes that sustainability doesn’t have to be achieved at the cost of high profitability, and vice versa. He hopes to make this statement the new ‘common sense’ within the industry, as Aqua Develop continues to grow and gain traction.
Their announcement as a finalist at Future Food Asia 2020 has recently helped them build a connection with several VCs, other startups, and potential partners within the ecosystem.
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Aqua Development hopes to further grow and expand its technology to drive down the initial setup costs so that small scale farmers in developing nations would be able to afford it. By making their technology more accessible, they can allow for domestic production in countries often reliant on food imports, thus adding resilience to the local supply chain.
Another ambition is to adapt and generalise the system to other species of crustaceans and fish, thus adding sustainability and profitability to a wider farming community. There is a long road ahead, but it’s the thrill of the process that keeps them moving forward.
Their greatest achievement thus far has been seeing their idea transition into a company with its large-scale project – slowly but surely, they’ll get there.
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