Could the world’s first land-based prawn farm in Scotland pave the way for more aquaculture on land?

The world’s first land-based, clean water prawn farm is to be launched in Scotland.

Great British Prawns at Balfron in Stirlingshire will begin harvesting up to one million prawns in summer 2019.

For the first time, the company will use specially developed aquaculture technology and sustainable energy to produce warm water king prawns in clear and clean water.

The farm will produce the world’s most popular prawn variety, the Pacific Whiteleg Shrimp, better known as the king prawn, which are native to the Eastern Pacific Ocean.

The farm arrives in Scotland amidst the current cloud of controversy and the environmental and ethical impacts surrounding fish farming in our seas.

While typical fish farming sees waste and chemicals pumped directly into the surrounding ocean, the land-based prawn farm says it will use a Recirculation Aquaculture System which cleans the majority of water used without contaminating the environment.

The UN’s Food and Agricultural Organisation states that global aquaculture needs to double in size over the next decade to keep pace with the ever-rising demand for quality protein.

However, experts also say over-fishing, the mismanagement of crucial feeding grounds and unsustainable farming methods are threatening the resilience of many fish stocks and the overall long-term supply of farmed fish to the global market.

Currently, the majority of the UK’s king prawns are imported frozen from Asia and Central America, a model widely criticised for its damaging environmental practices.

66% of the marine environment has been significantly altered by human actions and up to 55% of the world’s ocean area is covered by industrial fishing.

But building land-based farms in the UK will help to avoid the environmental impact of fish farming as well as  the need for freezing and zero air miles says Great British Prawns.

James McEuen, chairman and commercial director at Great British Prawns said: “Most prawns have traveled 6,000 miles to reach a UK consumer with worldwide demand continuing to grow.

“But we know that consumers are increasingly concerned about the environmental impact of seafood production and to be sustainable, the future of aquaculture really has to be land-based.

“This farm has the potential to lead a transformation in the way seafood is produced.  We aim to meet growing UK consumer demand for regional and local food production with the reassurance of outstanding husbandry, provenance and sustainability.”

The company also claims their new facility will be virtually waste free, and because of the closed filtration system won’t requrie antibiotics and other medication, chemicals and manual handling used widely in the existing prawn farming industry.

In addition they claim their system will lead to a more humane way of farming prawns.

Dr Andrew Whiston, Technical Director for the project said: “I’ve worked in aquaculture engineering for more than 25 years and this project is truly setting a worldwide precedent that will change the way prawns are farmed in the future.

“Focusing on getting the Recirculation Aquaculture System (RAS) exactly right, along with mimicking the precise conditions required for optimal prawn development has been a precision project that has required painstaking research and engineering.

“The outcome is an approach that impresses on its engineering, as well as its sustainability and humane methods.”

The prawns will be available initially to chefs within a two-hour radius of the farm, including Edinburgh and Glasgow.