I came to Guaymas to meet Oscar Valdez, owner of Pesquera Delly, a local fishing company that traded in its fishing boats for fish cages. However, I was never certain he knew I was coming. I showed up with my fingers crossed that I would land the interview and today my wish was granted.
It was all about the connections. The mother of my translator worked in shrimp aquaculture in the past and now runs a conservation organization in Guaymas. She knows Oscar Valdez personally and was able to put in a good word and line up an interview.
This morning my translator and I drove to a seafood processing plant in the industrial section of Guaymas. We waited in a small room that reeked of fish. A faded photo of a fishing trawler hung from the wall. The receptionist wore a white lab coat and white Wellington boots. At one point she left her desk and came back with a shower cap on.
Oscar Valdez arrives and takes us upstairs into his office, a large white industrial box with a table and desk. A ventilator in the wall above his desk offers a constant hum.
Pesquera Delly at its peak had 11 fishing boats in its fleet. Today there are two. Valdez says the business had become difficult as their wild catch fell as their costs increased. He knew it was a time to make a change. So, taking advantage of a government program that pays fishermen to trade in their fishing boats ($100,000 each), Valdez cashed in four and used the money to buy three AquaPods from Ocean Farm Technologies in Searsmont, Maine, with the idea being to farm shrimp in the Sea of Cortez.
Valdez's vision is to reduce the number of shrimp boats in Mexico, which would relieve pressure on the wild populations, and offer those former fishermen another option. He hopes to demonstrate that farming shrimp and other species is a viable business in the Sea of Cortez, one that could offer fishermen another chance at making a living from the sea.
The AquaPods were not designed for shrimp, which have very different needs from fish, so Valdez has been working with Ocean Farm Technologies to make modifications to the cages to accommodate shrimp. In fact, Steve Page, the owner of Ocean Farm Technologies, and some of his staff will be in Guaymas next week to meet with Valdez.
In addition to the three large AquaPods Pesquera Delly owns, they are also deploying eight small AquaPods as a test. Each of the eight will be deployed with unique characteristics -- like different placement of the floats, for example. The goal will be to find the characteristics best suited to farming shrimp in AquaPods. The first of the eight will go in the water next week.
Sonora is the shrimp producing capital of Mexico and it was in the 1990s when shrimp aquaculture surpassed the yield of fishing boats. However, traditional shrimp farming in Sonora consists of long shallow ponds on land, though near the shore so ocean water can be pumped through them. Valdez didn't want to go that route for various reasons. One was cost of shrimp feed. While feed consists of a large portion of the traditional shrimp farms' cost, Valdez says he needs to feed the shrimp in his AquaPods much less because their diets are supplemented with food from the wild that floats through the cages. He says a submerged cage also offers a healthier environment for shrimp.
I plan to visit Pesquera Delly again next week when Steve Page comes to visit and the company deploys the first small experimental AquaPod. So, more posts to come on this company.
* Originally posted to The New Aquaculture on Tuesday, November 10, 2009.
