Hi

I live on the westcoast on Vancouver Island in British Columbia Canada and am looking for information on the brown kelp farming industry in general. I am past the site development and application stage of my farm and just entering into the regulatory and public approvals process (Lord help me, what have I gotten myself into now?). Assuming I am through this stage in 6 months I hope to anchor my farm in place and start planting this fall. I will basically be a small Mom and Pop operation with a 2 ha deepwater site and a drying/packaging plant on my property.

I am starting on my business plan now for the purposes of acquiring financing and would greatly appreciate any useful information on markets, trends and outlooks for the industry. I would particularly like to find hard information or data on emerging environmental issues and conditions that might affect the future of the market e.g. how is pollution and population pressure in other area's expected to affect markets?

see this link to find bibligrafy about kelp

Scott,

Don't know if you will get this message, however, I was wondering if you could provide me with some of the information you used to get your kelp operation started. I am doing thesis research on kelp farm development this fall in south africa.

Thanks

Hi Scott,

I am doing a research project on the potential of kelp harvesting on the North Shore of Quebec. This region has suffered great unemployment over the past decade due to apathy of the fishing industry there and government regulations.

The North Shore is said to have miles upon miles of highly valuable kelp, but no one there knows much about farming it. I want to know about the process of getting into farming: the costs involved and the potential market, as well as the processing of kelp.

Any information you could give me would be valuable. Thanks for your time,

There is an FAO report on Kelp Farming in China, posted on line at
http://www.fao.org/docrep/field/003/AB724E/AB724E00.htm#TOC

Its is fairly detailed on the methods and technques used. Hope it is useful.