Seaweed. Jobs. $1.5 Trillion. The World Just Got Schooled on The Real Power of Sustainable Aquaculture

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Forget the lab. The ocean is now become the world’s most undervalued food factory and seaweed might just be its green gold.

A trillion-dollar opportunity doesn’t come along every day, but when it does, it often smells like fish. Or in this case, like salty chlorophyll and kelp noodles.

Harnessing the Waters Report Cover

The World Bank, WWF, and the Gordon & Betty Moore Foundation just dropped a sprawling new report outlining how sustainable aquaculture could feed the planet, fix the climate, and create 22 million new jobs by 2050. It’s a big fish story with one clear headline:

Seaweed is having a moment and it’s only just begun.

In 2022 alone, aquatic plants and algae, including seaweed, made up 29% of global aquaculture output, clocking over 35 million tonnes. Not bad for something not needing soil, feed, or even freshwater.

And unlike cows, seaweed won’t burp methane or flatten forests. In fact, it does the opposite, acting as a carbon sink, improving water quality, and even promising climate-repairing co-products like methane-reducing additives, bioplastics, textiles, construction materials, and pharma-grade extracts.

How much room is there to grow? Try 48 million square kilometres. That’s how much potential space the report pegs for offshore seaweed aquaculture. Not just for food, but for everything from bio-packaging to farm soil treatments to next-gen fabrics.

It’s not just about eating better seafood. It’s about rebuilding the way we think about planetary systems, with seaweed front and centre.

And yet, most of the attention in FoodTech still goes to bioreactors, fake meat IPOs, and AI-driven personal nutrition apps. All good. But none of them hold the scalable, regenerative, low-cost punch of ocean farming done right.

So where are Australia and New Zealand in this saltwater revolution?

Both nations have pristine coastlines, indigenous knowledge systems, world-class seafood sectors and yet have barely scratched the surface on large-scale seaweed aquaculture.

NZ’s got the Mussel story. Australia dabbles in Asparagopsis. But the real action, offshore farms producing multi-product kelp, linking to green construction, soil health, and carbon offset markets, is still mostly untapped.

Source: Public Domain - Harvesting Seaweed

If we’re serious about post-livestock protein futures, food security, or even just blue economy jobs for the next generation, this isn’t just an opportunity. It’s a national strategy waiting to happen.

From shrimp in Ecuador to salmon in Chile, Pangasius in Vietnam, and Black Tiger shrimp in Bangladesh, aquaculture is already powering exports, employment, and domestic food supply chains.

The $1.5 trillion investment forecast isn’t charity, it’s what the planet needs to avoid collapse by 2050.

Sustainable aquaculture isn’t niche. It’s survival.

Whether it’s seaweed for sushi, soil, or scaffolds, the timing is right for Australia and New Zealand to stop circling the tide pools and start farming the sea.

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