About the Aquaculture Strategy
In 2019, the Government released a strategy for developing aquaculture in New Zealand.
The New Zealand Government Aquaculture Strategy [PDF, 2.9 MB]
The aim is to make the industry more:
- sustainable
- productive
- resilient
- inclusive.
The strategy aims to identify government agencies' objectives and actions towards New Zealand becoming world-leading in sustainable and innovative aquaculture.
Sustainability objectives
- Promote and assist implementation of strategic integrated coastal and catchment planning to ensure a healthy aquatic environment.
- Partner with industry on a transition plan to reduce emissions and waste across the value chain
Productivity objectives
- Maximise value of all farmed space through a strong research, innovation and commercialisation system.
- Develop world-leading frameworks for open ocean and land-based farming.
- Support infrastructure needs to enable growth.
Resilience objectives
- Strengthen biosecurity management.
- Support the industry to adapt to climate change.
Inclusivity objectives
- Build Māori and community knowledge about aquaculture and their input into growth opportunities.
- Deliver the Crown’s aquaculture settlement obligations in a manner that facilitates early investment in new opportunities.
- Recognise Māori values and aspirations across the work programme
Measuring the strategy's success
We use 4 measures to gauge the success of the strategy, covering the growth and economic impact of the sector alongside its environmental performance. Reporting on these measures enables us to track progress and prioritise our work to deliver across all the strategy's outcomes. This reporting also aims to maintain and build public confidence in the industry's performance.
Working with other agencies
We will partner with other government agencies to achieve these objectives, including:
- Department of Conservation
- The Ministry for the Environment
- Te Puni Kōkiri
- Office for Māori Crown Relations – Te Arawhiti
- Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment
- New Zealand Trade and Enterprise.
How we will make things happen
The agencies responsible for the strategy will publish annual implementation plans. These will set key actions for the year and identify which agency is responsible for each action.
2023 aquaculture strategy implementation plan [PDF, 1.1 MB]
2022 aquaculture strategy implementation plan [PDF, 749 KB]
2021 aquaculture strategy implementation plan [PDF, 343 KB]
The strategy will be reviewed in 2025 to ensure it stays relevant to:
- the industry's growth and development
- evolving community interests and desires
- global changes that affect aquaculture.
Key actions delivered under the strategy
To maintain and grow the mussel industry, there must be a sufficient supply of spat which are the young mussels used to stock mussel farms. Spat are vulnerable and holding them at specific sites called spat nurseries can dramatically increase their survival rates. There, they become more robust and can then move to grow-out farm sites. MPI has prepared a summary that highlights the key role of spat nurseries. It also suggests opportunities that councils, industry and central government can collaborate on to better enable the use of such sites.
Enabling spat nurseries to grow New Zealand’s mussel sector [PDF, 269 KB]
A growing workforce is essential to a growing aquaculture industry. To help understand the workforce required for a bigger aquaculture industry, MPI commissioned forecasts of the Aquaculture sector’s workforce needs according to different growth scenarios. MPI’s Workforce Insights website provides data and insights on the broader food and fibre sector workforce. Food and fibre workforce insights
Future aquaculture workforce: Results from interviews and modelling [PDF, 1.5 MB]
Achieving the Aquaculture Strategy’s target of a sustainable, productive, resilient and inclusive $3 billion industry depends on a number of investments in infrastructure, research and people. We have developed an investment roadmap setting out these investments, to establish a shared understanding of what is required.
Accelerate the Aquaculture Strategy: investment roadmap [PDF, 616 KB]
This 2023 progress update reports on investments into aquaculture made by the Government, industry, and others to achieve the 3 growth pathways since they were identified in the investment roadmap.
Accelerate the Aquaculture Strategy: Investment Roadmap 2023 progress update [PDF, 7.2 MB]
Under the investment roadmap, we have worked with the industry to agree a work plan to secure mussel spat supply.
Agreed plan for securing mussel spat supply [PDF, 233 KB]
As the aquaculture industry grows we need to ensure this growth is environmentally sustainable. To measure and monitor this, we developed an approach for a repeatable method for measuring the environmental performance of aquaculture. This approach will be further developed and implemented over the next 2 years.
Report on a method and approach for measuring the environmental effects of aquaculture [PDF, 279 KB]
The Aquaculture Strategy identifies open ocean aquaculture as a key opportunity for sustainable growth. Given the scale of the opportunity and the investment required to progress it, we commissioned independent advice on the investment needs for open ocean aquaculture and how the Government could support its development. This paper does not represent Government policy, but will be considered as we progress work to support sustainable open ocean aquaculture.
Open Ocean Salmon Farming in New Zealand [PDF, 984 KB]
Find out more
Media release: Government delivers a plan for world-leading aquaculture industry – Beehive
Fishing and aquaculture funding and support
Who to contact
If you have questions about the aquaculture strategy, email info@mpi.govt.nz
