Global Trends in Seafood / Aquatic Q3 2025
Key themes in this Global Trends update:
Global seafood is pivoting to frontier-led growth: EU’s digital border makes data the ticket to trade, while gene editing, AI-native farms and digital twins move from plan to pilots. Supply risk is hedged by insect protein and algae omega-3; offshore wind co-location, parametric insurance and new public funding open scale and finance routes.
1. Gene editing moves from papers to pilot pathways
Global Insight: Leading genetics players signalled at Norway’s Aqua Nor that they are preparing salmon gene-editing applications focused on sea-lice resistance and growth. New studies identify narrow windows in the fish immune response that gene edits could target, tightening timelines from theory to practice.
NZ Relevance: If approvals advance in Europe or the United Kingdom first, early movers will shape the ethics, biosecurity controls and market claims that retailers accept. NZ can position in contained, pre-commercial trials tied to export-market rules.
NZ Advantage Play: Convene a university–industry ethics panel and scope a contained, land-based pre-commercial trial with a global genetics partner focused on lice resilience and welfare metrics.
Sources: Sources. Undercurrent News live from Aqua Nor (22 Aug 2025); Nofima research update (13 Jun 2025). Undercurrent News, Nofima
2. AI-native farms: computer vision and autonomy become a capex swap
Global Insight: Capital is flowing into robots and camera systems that automate net hygiene, biomass estimation and welfare checks. A Norwegian net-cleaning robot maker closed a growth round in July; lice-laser suppliers project steep sales gains, pointing to fleet-level adoption.
NZ Relevance: Replacing manual, diver-heavy routines with autonomous systems lifts yield and lowers biological loss events, while building the data spine needed for premium claims and insurance.
NZ Advantage Play: Launch a two-site retrofit bundling computer-vision biomass, autonomous net cleaning and welfare analytics on one data layer with hard targets for feed conversion, survival and antibiotic-free days.
Sources: SeafoodSource on Remora funding (21 Jul 2025); SeafoodSource on Stingray growth outlook (25 Jun 2025). SeafoodSource; SeafoodSource;
3. Retailers pull insect protein into mainstream shrimp supply
Global Insight: BioMar, Innovafeed and retailer Auchan announced a commercial model to bring insect-fed shrimp to European shelves, shifting insect meal from pilots to retail-anchored scale.
NZ Relevance: Once a retailer normalises a low-footprint feed in shrimp, buyers ask for similar moves in salmon and white-fish. That creates room for premium nutrition claims and emissions cuts.
NZ Advantage Play: Co-design a 500-ton test run with your feed mill substituting 5–10 percent insect meal, with independent lifecycle analysis and a retail customer named in the brief.
Sources: SeafoodSource (2 Sep 2025); Innovafeed release (early Sep 2025). SeafoodSource, Innovafeed
4. Non-marine omega-3 scales, hedging fish-oil shocks
Global Insight: Veramaris reported a 61 percent year-on-year increase in algae-oil output while cutting absolute emissions, signalling reliable, hedgeable supply for long-chain omega-3s.
NZ Relevance: This reduces exposure to anchoveta-driven fish oil volatility and supports differentiated nutrition claims in sensitive markets.
NZ Advantage Play: Lock a dual-source omega-3 strategy (algae plus marine) and run taste and nutrition A/B trials to underpin label claims in Europe and the United States.
Sources: Veramaris sustainability update (3 Jun 2025); Global Seafood Alliance coverage (5 Jun 2025). Veramaris, Global Seafood Alliance
5. Offshore wind co-location for mussels and seaweed moves from concept to pilots
Global Insight: EU-funded pilots such as ULTFARMS reported mid-year progress on offshore mussel and seaweed inside wind parks; utilities like Vattenfall are publicly promoting multi-use wind sites with food production.
NZ Relevance: Co-location can unlock consenting pathways, share operations costs and open new biomass zones aligned with energy infrastructure.
NZ Advantage Play: Commission a pre-feasibility with one power generator for a co-located mussel/kelp zone, referencing ULTFARMS engineering and biodiversity designs.
Sources: ULTFARMS Dutch pilot update (16 Jun 2025); Vattenfall newsroom (31 Jul 2025). ULTFARMS, Vattenfall
6. Parametric risk finance for blooms and heatwaves becomes investable
Global Insight: A 2025 peer-reviewed review sets out how ocean forecasts can underpin trigger-based insurance for harmful algal blooms and marine heat spikes. In Australia, government voices are already encouraging aquaculture to consider business-interruption cover as blooms intensify.
NZ Relevance: Trigger-based payouts tied to water-quality sensors can stabilise cashflow after closures, which improves bankability for expansion.
NZ Advantage Play: Build a harmful-algal-bloom index using continuous temperature, salinity and chlorophyll sensors at two shellfish sites and take it to market with a global insurer.
Sources: Reviews in Fish Biology and Fisheries (Jan 2025); Adelaide Now reporting (Jul 2025). SpringerLink, Adelaide Now
7. EU border goes fully digital: data, not paperwork, becomes the gate
Global Insight: The European Commission confirmed that, from January 2026, all seafood imports must use its central CATCH system for catch certificates; additional traceability rules and lot-marking are being finalised.
NZ Relevance. Faster clearance and premium positioning will depend on event-level data that lines up with European schemas, not just a PDF certificate.
NZ Advantage Play. Run an event-level traceability pilot with one mussel and one finfish exporter using global GS1 data standards mapped to CATCH, and rehearse border submissions in a sandbox by early 2026.
Sources: European Commission fisheries control update (9 Jan 2024, confirming the 2026 start); Market Advisory Council note on delegated act (Mar–May 2025). Oceans and fisheries, marketac.eu
8. Digital twins arrive in aquaculture operations
Global Insight. The University of Bergen launched “FishMet,” a digital-twin model that mirrors fish metabolism to optimise feeding strategies, while the European Digital Twin of the Ocean infrastructure is rolling out tools and hackathons for operational pilots, including aquaculture.
NZ Relevance. Digital twins allow farms to simulate outcomes before they spend: feed programmes, growth curves and risk scenarios can be tested virtually and then executed with higher confidence.
NZ Advantage Play. Pair one farm site with a university modeller to build a feed-efficiency digital twin and commit to a quarter-by-quarter “simulate then deploy” cycle tied to measured savings.
Sources: The Fish Site on FishMet (18 Aug 2025); EDITO programme update (Jun 2025). The Fish Site, EDITO
9. Autonomous net hygiene reaches scale backed by new capital
Global Insight: Multiple outlets reported a mid-July growth round for a Norwegian autonomous net-cleaning company, signalling investor confidence in full-time robotic cleaning with embedded inspection.
NZ Relevance: Continuous, gentle cleaning improves oxygen flow and reduces disease pressure, translating directly into survival and growth gains.
NZ Advantage Play: Aggregate demand across three farms for a multi-year robot lease with shared spares and uptime guarantees; tie payments to mortality and growth key performance indicators.
Sources: Intrafish (10 Jul 2025); Fish Farming Expert (10 Jul 2025). Intrafish, Fish Farming Expert
10. Government money is on the table for flagship aquaculture consortia
Global Insight. The United States National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration opened a multi-year competition to establish a new Cooperative Institute dedicated to aquaculture research and market development, with detailed priorities and a July launch.
NZ Relevance. Trans-Pacific consortia that combine NZ deployment with overseas science partners can bid into these calls, secure matched funding and access new datasets.
NZ Advantage Play. Form a cross-border consortium around one disruptive theme (for example, algae-based oils or digital-twin farms) and target this competition plus aligned European calls.
Sources: NOAA funding notice (22 Jul 2025); NOAA FAQs PDF (23 Jul 2025). NOAA Fisheries, NOAA Fisheries
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