Chinese aquaculture project seeks to reverse sea-bed desertification

A city on China’s heavily overfished Yellow Sea coast is seeking to create artificial reefs on an industrial scale as part of its plan for offshore aquaculture. 

Vessels are dropping pre-fabricated concrete boxes into Bohai Bay, off the shore of Tangshan in Hebei Province, as part of the Tangshan Ocean Pasture project. The project is driven by local government and which involves the Tangshan Ocean Ranch Co. working alongside researchers from the Ocean Research Institute at the China Academy of Sciences, an institution that enjoys much prestige among policymakers and the public in China. 

The white concrete boxes are loaded with seeds and micro-organisms intended to anchor algae and thus promote the growth of shellfish and fish, according to a statement from Tangshan Ocean Ranch Co., which also noted that overfishing and pollution had turned much of the seabed into “deserts.”

Ringed by a necklace of some of China biggest ports: Dalian, Tianjin, Tangshan (the collective name for three ports: Caofedian, Jingtang, and Fennan), and Huanghua, the Bohai Bay’s ecosystem has been ruined by overfishing and land reclamation that has destroyed much of its wetlands. Bohai Bay has suffered from excesses of nitrogen and phosphorous, as well as oil spills and petrochemical pollution, according to a report prepared by the China Academy of Sciences.

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