One of White Panther’s “mountain shrimp”
The company noticed a clear uptick in quality when they changed from biofloc to clearwater RAS
© White Panther
How do you see the project developing in the years ahead?
White Panther will expand the farming of fresh mountain prawns from 35 tonnes last year to around 70 tonnes and then grow continuously in line with customer demand.
In the hatchery, our aim is to supply European indoor shrimp farms with healthy post-larvae, bred in artificial salt water and completely virus-free. Last year we produced 2 million PLs each month.
How long do you think it will take for the farm to become profitable?
A large proportion of the costs are for research and development work. Basically, it can be said that a quick return on investment in indoor shrimp farming cannot be expected; rather, a period of 6-8 years should be assumed. White Panther had the best prerequisites due to the available resources and the owners’ willingness to continuously implement the research findings.
What are the main markets for your shrimp and have you been impacted by the downturn in prices that has hit conventionally farmed shrimp?
The markets for fresh and frozen mountain shrimp are the upmarket retail trade, the upmarket gastronomy and hotel industry, and, in direct marketing, the end consumer in private households.
Our fresh shrimp cost on average 77 percent more than frozen goods imported into Europe. We do not see imported shrimps as our competition, but rather our fresh shrimps to complement the product range for special occasions.
Although purchase prices have fallen worldwide, we in Europe are hardly feeling the effects of this, as supermarket chains have increased their margins. We see the fresh shrimp as a separate product that is not aligned with global market prices.
What advice would you give to anyone considering starting up – or investing in – an indoor shrimp farm?
When looking for companies that supply technical equipment, I would advise to pay attention to the reference projects they can show and to visit these. Furthermore, the planning calculation should be set up in such a way that a reinvestment is planned after three years.
An important point is the selection of the right personnel, who are essential for the management of the shrimp farm, because you can only run a successful breeding operation with committed and developable employees.
Source link : https://thefishsite.com/articles/white-panther-austrias-indoor-shrimp-innovator
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Publish date : 2024-10-02 07:00:00
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