Yantai CIMC Raffles Offshore Limited (CIMC Raffles) is partnering with the Shandong Ocean Group, the Guoxin Development Group, and Chinese several research institutions and universities to create an industry cluster producing equipment and seafood worth “hundreds of billons of yuan” annually.
Yantai CIMC Raffles Offshore Limited, a builder of offshore vessels and marine engineering equipment, is a joint venture of the state-controlled CIMC Group. It wants to build and operate 100 aquaculture cages monitored with 5G telecommunications equipment off the Chinese coastline.
Representatives of the three corporations involved in the project, as well as researchers from Shanghai Jiaotong University and the Qingdao-based Yellow Sea Fisheries Research Institute, met at the CIMC Ocean Engineering Research Institute in June 2022 to launch a demonstration project to determine their capabilities of farming with their bespoke cold-water and warm-water marine aquaculture systems.
In March 2022, the company installed the first batch of four “intelligent” aquaculture cages in the sea off east China's Shandong province as part of a 100 Fish-Farm Boxes Project, involving its parent company China International Marine Containers Group and the municipal government of Yantai. The effort is the first part of a project the company said will be the “biggest and most high-tech mariculture ranch in Asia.” An additional 10 to 15 cages are expected to be delivered in 2023, according to CIMC, which delivered a similar system to Norwegian salmon producer Nordlaks in 2020.
In March 2022, the state-owned Guoxin Development Group (which also uses the English name Qingdao Conson Development Group) launched the “world’s first 100,000-ton smart aquaculture vessel,” the Guoxin Number 1, in Qingdao. Guoxin said the vessels will allow it to dramatically and rapidly expand production of high-end species such as yellow croaker, grouper, and salmon.
Aquaculture equipment is becoming a new source of revenue for CIMC, according to Guo Fuyuan, general manager of Yantai CIMC Blue Ocean Technology Co Ltd (CIMC Blue), a subsidiary of CIMC Raffles that manufactures marine fishery equipment.
Liu Fuxiang, technical manager of CIMC Blue, described the aquaculture space as “another blue sea market," alongside the oil and gas field industry, which has traditionally been a company mainstay. According to Liu, at 60 meters in length and 60 meters in width, the CIMC “intelligent cage” is the largest of its kind in Asia, and has the capacity to produce 600 to 700 metric tons of fish per year.
“The intelligent equipment also carries a 5G network, marine data, and underwater monitoring systems, providing a near-wild environment for fishes to breed and grow. Only four workers are needed to operate on the platform,” Liu said.
Photo courtesy of Yantai CIMC Raffles Offshore Limited
