ALOH MER Designing and developing a co-culture sector at sea

ALOH Mer is a project aiming to develop an innovative aquaculture production system in the open ocean, allowing several local species to be cultivated at the same time. These are sugar kelp (S. latissima), the Pacific oyster (Crassostrea gigas), and two gastropods: the green ormer (Haliotis tuberculata) and the common periwinkle (Littorina littorea).

It will be the first time these four species have been cultivated within a single facility and the resulting products will be of premium quality: early kelp, special oysters, open-water ormer and jumbo periwinkles.

To provide co-culture in the open ocean, this project will rely on prototype floating crates. These were developed very recently in Australia and France to rear oysters in intertidal zones or lagoons