Johnny Liesman is a Brooklyn, New York-based freelance journalist with a focus on fisheries, sustainability, and health. His work has been featured in publications including the Portland Press Herald, Health Central, Popular Mechanics, and the Provincetown Independent. He also works for a NY-based magazine writer, pitching and researching longform narrative stories. Johnny graduated from Bowdoin College in 2022 where he studied American Politics and Jazz Music Composition. When he's not writing, he's probably cooking, eating, or playing the piano.
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On the Greek island of Poros – just over 30 miles southwest of Athens – residents have protested the construction of aquaculture operations in the Saronic Gulf for over a decade, arguing that such farms cause environmental harm, bring little economic benefit to the island, and rarely consider public input in their design and implementation.
In early August, those protestors scored a big victory when Greece’s Central Council for
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Avaldsnes, Norway-headquartered aquaculture firm Amar Seafood has been hard at work expanding a former hatchery facility into a full-fledged land-based farm in Prince Edward Island (PEI), Canada, that will eventually produce nearly 600 metric tons (MT) of halibut and spotted wolffish annually.
The only company in North America with a mature broodstock of both Atlantic halibut and spotted wolffish, Amar joins just one other company in the world
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Commercial fishing for European eels on Lough Neagh, a 148-square-mile freshwater lake in Northern Ireland, has been suspended until the middle of July, with some experts warning that the same issues that caused the temporary closure may soon plague other bodies of water across the U.K.
Fishing for eels on Lough Neagh was originally suspended just one week into this year’s season on 12 May due to low fat content in the eels.
Soon after, on
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The Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council (WPFMC) is calling on the U.S. Department of Commerce (DOC) to “address severe funding shortfalls that threaten the future of fisheries management.”
However, the council’s calls are coming at a time when the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump is reportedly planning to slash NOAA’s budget, which funds the council, by 27 percent for the 2026 fiscal
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For the oyster industry in the Canadian province of Prince Edward Island (PEI), this winter has been no ordinary offseason.
Less than a year ago, Multinucleate Sphere Unknown (MSX), a disease caused by the parasite Haplosporidium nelsoni, was first discovered on PEI, and oyster farmers and harvesters are now anxiously waiting to see what will become of their livelihood when the ice thaws.
“Everybody's kind of holding their breath, not sure
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Blue Water Farms, an aquaculture startup in the U.S. state of Minnesota aiming to develop the first large-scale commercial walleye farm in the U.S., is partnering with SIFT Group to adopt its recirculating aquaculture system (RAS) technology.
SIFT, a Norway-based aquaculture technology company, recently developed and successfully piloted a land-based RAS that features raceways with constant flow to mimic a natural river. SIFT said the system
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The U.S. state of Minnesota recently released a draft of a new state aquaculture plan, drawing a wide array of public opinions that all agree the industry has potential in the state.
Just how much potential, though, has been up for debate.
The draft plan, commissioned by the Minnesota Department of Agriculture (MDA) and prepared by Portland, Maine, U.S.A.-based Steamboat Consulting, is the first of its kind since 1989 in the state, and outlines
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