Any activity either on land or in the ocean needs to identify and mitigate potential associated risks. That process is called environmental risk assessment (ERA). In Asia, seaweed cultivation is a well developing industry since the 1950’s. In Norway, the activity was mainly focused on research and pilot scale cultivation until the first commercial permission granted in 2014. in Norway a regulation for environmental risk assessment regarding seaweed cultivation has not been fully developed yet. Therefore, the industry lacks a standardized protocol for risk assessment. Methodology that has been developed by scientific communities partly require qualified personnel and are expensive. In this study, we propose cost effective methodology for farmers focusing on the topics proposed for the Norwegian regulations: i) genetic interactions between cultivated and wild seaweed, ii) spread of invasive species and diversity changes in ecological communities ecosystems, ii) epiphytes and diseases and iv) changes in the sediment.

Primary Presenter: Ana Borrero, Seaweed Solutions (borrero@seaweedsolutions.com)

Authors:

Ana Borrero-Santiago, Seaweed Solutions AS  (borrero@seaweedsolutions.com)

Glaucia Fragoso, Department of Biology, Norwegian University of Science & Technology (NTNU), Trondheim (Norway)  (glaucia.m.fragoso@ntnu.no)

Alexander Jüterbock, Faculty of Biosciences and Aquaculture, NORD University, Bodø (Norway)  (alexander.juterbock@nord.no)

Artur Zolich, Department of Engineering Cybernetics, Faculty of Information Technology and Electrical Engineering, Trondheim (Norway)  (artur.zolich@ntnu.no)