Good Fortune Bay Fisheries RMI Inc., a subsidiary of a Queensland, Australia-based commercial fish farming company, has invested more than $3 million into operations in Majuro, said project manager Ben Lawes Friday.
But he said uncertainty over export logistics and costs to ship live fish from Majuro to Asia and the United States are forcing the company to temporarily suspended operations in this north Pacific nation.
GFB Fisheries RMI Inc. has been operating a fish hatchery in Majuro for more than a year, growing barramundi cod and cobia, two sought after fish.
GFB operates large scale fish hatcheries in two Queensland locations. The closure of GFBs facility in Majuro impacts about five Marshall Islanders who have been working with the company.
“Recent significant increases in air freight costs for live fish primarily by Continental Airlines and the global downturn in markets have affected the business strategy of this operation,” said Lawes. “Air linkages with Majuro are also proving unreliable in obtaining confirmed freight space.”
Timely delivery of live fish to markets overseas is critical, he said.
“As a consequence we are reassessing our project and investigating other avenues of transport to and from Majuro.”
Despite these problems, GFB has proved it “can grow fish commercially at Majuro,” said Lawes.
The problem now is what to do with a thousand of kilos of mature fish in cages in Majuros lagoon.
GFB has “a lot of fish in the water at this time,” he said. “We have some barramundi cod from the pilot trials that are at market size and also the initial cobia brought over as a trial — now a couple of thousand pounds of fish. We would prefer to sell these fish locally on island and are investigating options at this time.”
But smaller barramundi cod on the farm were killed by euthanizing them, “a decision which does not come lightly with the money already invested in them.”
Lawes said the company “looks forward to resuming operations once logistics issues have been resolved and global markets stabilize.”
