Aquaculture and customary fisheries

Aquaculture and customary fisheries farm and harvest freshwater and saltwater fish and shellfish.

Aquaculture includes customary and commercial aquaculture of freshwater and marine mahinga kai species. Aquaculture presents an opportunity to enhance customary fisheries and to build up and restore taonga species stocks of freshwater and marine species such as tuna, whitebait, kōura, kākahi, kina, pāua and toheroa. Read more about customary and commercial opportunities in from Wai Māori.

Wai Māori website 

Aquaculture also presents opportunities around communal and social activities and mātauranga Māori. This may include restoration of traditional fishing methods, recovering awareness of traditional uses of river flows and timing of seasonal and communal harvesting and reinforcement of traditional social activities associated with mahinga kai areas.

In these pages Kaitiaki Tools explores:

• The impact of commercial aquaculture industry on marine and freshwater environments.
• The impacts of industry and land based activities on mahinga kai and customary fisheries.

The main aquaculture species currently harversted in Aotearoa are marine species, green-lipped mussels, pāua, lobster, salmon and pacific oysters. A limited amount of freshwater farming occurs for carp, kōura, whitebait, and prawns. The freshwater aquaculture industry is relatively undeveloped and may be seen in the future as a way to enhance wild stock or take pressure of depleting fish stocks.

Kaitiaki Tools will help you identify activities and environmental impacts specifically related to aquaculture and the associated impacts.