Fish & Seafood

Australis Barramundi a ‘Best Choice’ For Sustainability

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Australis Aquaculture, the world’s largest and only vertically-integrated producer of barramundi, has received a “Best Choice” green rating for sustainability from the Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch program for its offshore marine farm in Vietnam. The designation came after an extensive, multi-year evaluation of the company’s operations.

Regarded as one of the most respected seafood assessment systems, Seafood Watch recommendations provide consumers, chefs and wholesale buyers with science-based guidance about the environmental sustainability of a wide range of farmed and wild-caught seafood products. For farmed fish, the program evaluates potential impacts including feed efficiency, habitat and water quality impacts, disease, use of chemicals, and escape risks.

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Turner Falls, Massachusetts, USA-headquartered Australis Aquaculture was founded in 2004 and has been operating in Central Vietnam since 2007.  The company’s farming operations draw on a hybrid approach that combines onshore closed containment tanks with offshore grow-out cages in the open ocean. Low-density stocking, lack of chemical usage and closely monitored feeding all contributed to the “Best Choice” ranking.  

“We have been working toward this since the very beginning,” said Josh Goldman, Australis’ ceo. “We received a ‘Best Choice’ rating for our land-based barramundi farm in Massachusetts in 2006, and have always believed that the same level of sustainability was achievable on our marine farms.”

The company spearheaded the introduction of barramundi as a key culinary trend in North America, and now offers a full line of barramundi products to both retail and foodservice markets under the Australis, Clean Harvest and The Better Fish brands and through private labels. The fish is processed within four hours of harvest. A state-of-the-art blast freezing system brings the temperature of hand-cut fillets down to -30°F prior to glazing and vacuum packing.