AUTHOR: Mary Ellen Walling, Chief Sustainability Officer at OPEN BLUE
With 80% of the world’s fisheries nearing full exploitation, offshore aquaculture will help reverse the trend by supplying fish to a growing world population. Removed from sensitive nearshore areas the open ocean environment offers pristine conditions for the development of environmentally friendly seafood products.
Open Blue is transforming how the world grows protein. We believe open ocean aquaculture – done correctly- is the answer. Our native warm-water cobia are raised 11 to 12 kilometers offshore on the Caribbean coastline in low density, fully submerged SeaStations TM and swim in high energy currents. Corroborated by third party analysis Open Blue has achieved several credible international certifications including the ASC standard becoming the first and currently only ASC certified cobia operation. Our benthic seafloor monitoring shows minimal effect to the seafloor, our feed is 100% sourced from sustainable sources and we have 100% traceability through the lifecycle of the fish from egg to market.
Open Blue’s people are the most valuable part of our business. We provide an inclusive workplace that drives our success as a sustainable company. A high level of problem solving and innovative thinking is at the heart of our teams and we embrace all the opportunities and challenges that a diverse workforce offers.
The local communities in the Costa Arriba region where we farm are important to our company. Our local employees live in these communities and the continued health and wellbeing of the community members is important to us. Education and health are our priorities. Open Blue invests in local students, providing 45 annual scholarships since 2011, and clean drinking water projects, drilling wells and supporting the related pumping infrastructure.
We aim to delight every single Open Blue customer. Deep frozen Open Blue Cobia boneless, skinless portions in 100g, 130g and 400g sizes are the result of a paradigm shift within the seafood foodservice sector driven by the awareness that this product represents positive innovative change for Food Service by offering:
- Consistency, resulting in less food waste
- Reduced labour costs, improving food preparation efficiencies
- Ease of preparation for both cooked or raw menu applications
- 24-month shelf life with freezer stable inventories
- Responsible Water Use
- Additive Free
- Fully traceable Egg to Ocean to Plate marine protein
- Shipping Cobia by sea instead of by air results in a 98% reduction of Greenhouse Gas emissions (CO2) associated with primary transport
We support our customers to help them achieve their own sustainability goals and to encourage them to pass to the word along to others to join in our journey. We invite you to join us for a meal soon.
