Oman Aquaculture Development Company (OADC), a subsidiary of Oman Investment Fund (OIF), a wholly government owned sovereign wealth fund specializes in investments in the aquaculture sector.
The company is investing in fish farming projects that lead to the development of aquaculture sector in the sultanate, including shrimp farming, finfish, shellfish and seaweed ventures. The company is also investing in the establishment of support industries to the fish farming sector, including hatcheries and feed factories.
The company plans to launch work on three new fish farming projects in 2018 — part of a growing portfolio of aquaculture schemes designed to augment fish production in the face of dwindling domestic supplies of staple fish species.
The new ventures, which include a major hatchery as well, will effectively position OADC — the aquaculture investment arm of OIF — as a major player in the rapidly evolving fish farming sector in the Sultanate.
According to a key official of the state-owned entity, the new investments will build on OADC’s successful maiden project that commenced operation at Qurayat in Muscat Governorate earlier 2017 year.
OADC’s first aquaculture investment at Qurayat has a capacity to produce 3,000 tonnes of kofar (sea bream) per annum.
A similar project, albeit of a capacity of around 6,000 tonnes per annum, is also planned at Qurun in South Al Sharqiyah Governorate. Also on the anvil is a major hatchery with a capacity to produce 15 million juveniles of a fin fish species. Finally, at Beemah, OADC plans to invest in a cage farm project of a capacity of around 3,000 tonnes.
A master-plan for aquaculture development in the Sultanate, formulated by the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries, envisages an annual output of around 200,000 metric tonnes of farmed fish by the year 2040, alongside the creation of some 11,000 additional jobs for Omanis.