Neil Sims paused briefly last week when asked a question during a panel discussion on aquaculture in U.S. federal waters, held at the SeaWeb Seafood Summit in St. Julian’s, Malta.
The usually verbose CEO of Kampachi Farms was asked to describe his decade-plus of experiences working with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), which oversees fish farming in offshore waters, 3 to 200 miles off the coast.
“It’s challenging,” he told the moderator, Konstantine Rountos, an assistant professor at St. Joseph’s College and scientific advisor to a proposed offshore striped bass operation in the northwest Atlantic Ocean. Opting for diplomacy, Sims quickly concluded: “Our commercial aspirations are in Mexico, in the Sea of Cortez. The government there says, ‘What can we do to help?’ … They understand the importance aquaculture.”
Sims went on to describe frustrating interactions with the agency when his company was seeking permits to farm kampachi (Seriola rivoliana) several miles off the shore of Hawaii, in federally managed waters. Sims and his business associates still conduct research in Hawaii, but have moved their burgeoning commercial operation to Mexico, which has been far more welcoming to his enterprise…
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