The Australian tuna farming industry each year required between 50,000 and 60,000 tons annually to feed its farmed tuna.
Now new fish factories are popping up around Australia’s main tuna farming port, Port Lincoln, as the local fishing companies that supply the tuna industry with pilchards adopt a new strategy.
Pilchard fishers association president Norm Craig said at least six large building projects to house processing and freezing equipment were now underway in Port Lincoln.
"A number of fishing companies have concluded that the way to service the tuna industry is to provide the product on demand and the only way to do that is to have large cold storage facilities and a backlog of frozen stock to ensure a consistent supply," Craig said. "In the past, locally hard-earned dollars were exported overseas to purchase stocks from offshore."
The benefits for the region from the new strategy would come from the construction activity as well as the workforce needed to operate the blast freezers and packaging equipment, he said. "Each large factory will employ a substantial number of people," Craig said.
The industry believed the current pilchard quota of around 35,000 tons or 2,500 tons for each of the 14 license holders was a sustainable harvest, with the quota amount being reviewed on an annual basis. "So far indications are that stocks are very strong and are quite likely to stay the same if not expand," he said.
The industry has announced results from tests conducted by independent laboratories indicated local pilchards had a very favorable fat content of around six per cent.
The pilchard industry is also continuing the practice of directly delivering pilchards from the catcher boats to feed boats out at tuna farm sites, which saved costs and reduced crowding at the wharves.
Craig said the industry acknowledged there could be a perception that not all the catch was officially being counted in logbooks and against the quota during offshore loading. However, cheating would be nearly impossible given the scrutiny of authorities and companies would not risk doing the wrong thing.