Akuvatur, an Izmir based fish producer, is not content to focus merely on seabass and seabream. It focuses on diversification of species farming real dentex , blue spotted seabream and pink dentex.
It has 80 cages in three different locations, all of which are one to two miles offshore. Its market split is 70% domestic and 30% for export – mainly to Europe. Some of the fish produced for export can weigh in at 1.5-2kg, and take up to three and half years to reach market weight.
So the focus at Akuvatur is a little niche – but then it can afford to do this – it is in the business of supplying luxury restaurants both at home and away.
Production
It produces around 700-1,000 tonnes per year at its farms, but it has plans to up this to 1,500 in the near future. It has a processing and packaging plant only a half hour’s drive from the nearest farm – meaning a very quick turn-around time from harvesting to delivery.
Akuvatur has three hatcheries in Milas, Adana and Izmir and has a large focus on the development of new species and marketing them commercially.
Mr Sükrü Eker, cage manager, told World Fishing & Aquaculture that the emphasis is very much on “marketing new species”, which means that the company is not as reliant on the seabass and seabream markets as many other farms and processors in the Izmir and Muğla regions.
Dentex is one of its main focuses – kept in cages ranging from 16-23m in diameter with a depth of around 20m. Blue spotted seabream is sold at a market weight of 300g, instead of the usual seabream weight of around 250g. Juvenile fish are put into the cages at around 60g and when they reach 80-100g the adults are separated and then fed up until they reach their market weights.
The fish can be harvested all year round, and during the summer, the busiest season for the company, there can be up to five harvests in a week done by Akuvatur’s five harvesting and processing vessels.
