Sturgeon farming in Madagascar – who would have thought?

Dear reader,

If you thought abalone (Haliotis sp.) takes a long time and a lot of investment to grow and produce seafood from (~5 years of culturing and nurturing), you would be correct... but producing but sturgeon is even more so. In this edition of the Cultured Carp, we explore sturgeon farming, and in one of the more unlikely places one would envision for it…the highlands of Madagascar!

That’s right, Madagascar. The first sturgeon farm in Africa and the Indian Ocean region, Acipenser, is located on Lake Mantasoa in the highands of Madagascar. The farm is aptly named after the genus name of several sturgeon species (Acipenser sp.); and employs an estimated 300 staff, the majority of which (80%) are employed from local villages that surround Lake Mantasoa (McBain 2020). The farm produces caviar under the Rova Caviar name, which was established in 2009 but only commenced trading in 2017 after having to wait for eight years for their first generation of sturgeon to grow to sexual maturity and produce eggs (McBain 2020).

Rova Caviar was started by three French founders, among them Delphine Dabezies who has lived in Madagascar for more than 30 years. In an interview Delphine mentioned that: “The day we produced the first caviar in Madagascar was a real relief because in the southern hemisphere, as I said, there are few farms. The second point is that no one had tried the experiment before, to produce sturgeons in Madagascar, we could have had a bad caviar, we were not sure. So when we saw that the product was excellent and that Malagasy terroir [territory and environment] really managed to transmit this level of excellence into the product, it was a great relief” (AfricaNews 2024).

Figure: Acipenser farm (from Acipenser website).

“At 1,400 metres above sea level about sixty kilometres east of Antananarivo and far removed from any industries and cities, Lake Mantasoa covers 2,000 hectares to a depth of 4 - 10 metres. It is a vast impluvium (Google it, it’s interesting) that collects only rainwater and is therefore protected from pollution. The fish farming ponds are fed by the waters of this lake. The Acipenser fish farm comprises nineteen large ponds, a hatchery, an area dedicated to pre-growout, a feed mill and a processing workshop spread over more than 8 hectares on the banks of a river fed by Lake Mantasoa upstream. It is this same lake that hosts the sturgeon when they reach 1.5 kilos in weight, holding them in about fifty giant 25m-diameter cages. Acipenser opted from the start for vertical integration with very few middlemen, giving it total control of production and fish-stock traceability in order to deliver outstanding caviar” (Acipenser 2024).

Figure: Juvenile sturgeon on Acipenser farm (from Acipenser website).

“Fish-farming performance in Madagascar is outstanding. Oocytes (unfertilised eggs) measure 2.7-2.9 mm when the fish are 6 years old and weigh 9 kg on average. The caviar yield is also impressive, averaging 15% in the farm (which is about 1.35kg of caviar when the fish is 6 years old). In 2019 4.2 tons of caviar were produced, falling to 3.22 tons in 2020 due to Covid-19, but production rose to around 9.2 tons in 2021. For the time being, the two caviar-producing species on the farm are the Baerii, ideal for a first taste and discovering caviar, and the Ossetra, the favourite of leading Chefs. So, it has taken ten years to build the farm and import all the species we wanted, and it will take another ten years to give each species enough time to produce its caviar. Acipenser will have reached its cruising speed by 2029.” (Acipenser 2024).

Figure: A tin of Rova Caviar (from Rova caviar website).

Sturgeon farming is a business model that requires substantial early investment and patience. But it is well worth the wait, as a 250g tin of Rova Caviar’s Supreme range is priced at around USD 750 (which is just shy of R13 000, McBain 2020). Rova says that the low density of fish in its lake – around a third of its French competitors – leads to a superior product, while established trade links between Madagascar and France bring the product to market. (McBain 2020). China is a significant consumer of the global supply of caviar (who would have thought…), but it is also the country from which producers like Rova face their greatest competition (McBain 2020), as the most significant producer of aquaculture products globally.

Figure: Sturgeon are slow growing fish with late onset of sexual maturity, making sturgeon aquaculture a more sustainable alternative compared to fishing wild populations.

Sturgeon aquaculture has emerged as a source of caviar that is less impactful than fishing but requires significant initial investment and time, since most of the sturgeon species are large, slow-growing fish with late sexual onset, and its production is, consequently, an extremely long process (Onofri et al. 2024). This limits the amount of farmed caviar that can meet demand, keeping prices high, and short-term profitability. Nonetheless, techniques for sex determination and growth acceleration are being explored to improve efficiency and profitability (Yom Din et al. 2020). Sustainable caviar production, moreover, requires responsible aquaculture practices, such as the use of optimal feed formulations, water quality monitoring, and broodstock management. Sturgeon aquaculture is water-intensive and implies careful management of the farming processes to minimize environmental impacts, including water quality control and waste management, activities that can add operational costs (Onofri et al. 2024). Sturgeon aquaculture also faces additional challenges: start-up costs are high, as building and operating sturgeon farms require significant investments in infrastructure and specialized expertise (Onofri et al 2024). But despite a number of farms operating successfully around the world, there is relatively limited published literature surrounding sturgeon aquaculture and best practices (compared to the aquaculture of more common species).

Figure: There are multiple species of sturgeon fish, and each produce caviar with unique characteristics.

Caviar quality, in turn, is influenced by several factors, such as the sturgeon species (e.g., the Beluga sturgeon, Huso huso, from which the most expensive caviar comes from; Siberian sturgeon, Acipenser baerii; white sturgeon, A. transmontanus, and Russian sturgeon, A. gueldenstaedtii), the formulated diets, the farming conditions, the egg processing methods, and the size and colour of the eggs (Lopez et al. 2020). Superior quality justifies a premium price for caviar, which is by nature a luxury product. From this perspective, the limited and controlled supply of caviar combined with high production costs translate into high caviar prices for consumers. This holds true despite the different caviar grades and types that exist, which are able to satisfy a wider range of price points and specific consumer preferences (Tavakoli et al. 2021).

Figure: Sturgeon females are usually killed when caviar is harvested from them.

Collectively, the need to kill the fish to harvest their caviar, their slow growth, habitat degradation, and overfishing of wild sturgeon have contributed to the decline of multiple wild sturgeon populations (including multiple species) globally and have resulted in sturgeon being listed on the IUCN Red list of threatened species among some off the most critically endangered species globally (IUCN 2010). So much so that even a decade ago, twenty-seven species of sturgeon were listed on the IUCN Red List with 63% listed as Critically Endangered, the Red List’s highest category of threat (IUCN 2010). The threatened status of sturgeon advocates and incentivises the practice of sturgeon aquaculture, which can be done in a more sustainable manner relative to previous capture fisheries.

Figure: Modern techniques allow sturgeon eggs to be harvested without the need to kill the adult fish.

Modern techniques and methodologies (developed by Angela Kohler in 2014) allow for the stripping of sturgeon eggs without the need to kill the fish (known as ‘no-kill caviar’), by injecting a protein to induce labour and massaging the fish to expel the eggs from the body (Greenaway 2014). This allows the same fish to produce multiple clutches of eggs for caviar production throughout its long lifespan (60-120 years, Harris 2014). Killing an endangered sturgeon just to harvest its eggs for consumption has been viewed as unethical; and the methods and ability to harvest sturgeon eggs without needing to kill the adult female has subsequently increased the apparent social acceptance of sturgeon aquaculture and caviar as a product. Lambert and Emam (2024) discusses the welfare implications of sturgeon aquaculture and in particular the non-lethal methods of harvesting eggs vs the traditional practice where the female is killed during harvesting. The authors concluded that, on balance: “the welfare issues involved with non-lethal caviar production are too sizeable to warrant its description as an ‘ethical or humane’ alternative to traditional caviar production” (Lambert and Emam 2024). It may thus be the case the killing the female at the time of harvesting is the more ethical option between the two.

Caviar aquaculture may have produced more food for thought than first anticipated…

Ciao for now.

The Cultured Carp

References:

Acipenser: https://acipenser-madagascar.com/en/la-ferme

Africa News (2024). Madagascar farm produces luxurious caviar. Available at: https://www.africanews.com/2019/09/23/madagascar-farm-produces-luxurious-caviar//

Greenaway, T. (2014). No-kill Caviar: Can it save an endangered species?. Online article. Civil Eats. Available at: https://civileats.com/2014/03/10/no-kill-caviar/

Harris, J. (2014). How a sturgeon massage can produce caviar without killing the fish. Online article. Los Angeles Times. Available at: https://www.latimes.com/food/dailydish/la-dd-sturgeon-massage-vivace-caviar-without-killing-fish-20140403-story.html

IUCN (2010). Sturgeon more critically endangered than any other group of species. International Union for the Conservation of Nature. Available online at: https://iucn.org/content/sturgeon-more-critically-endangered-any-other-group-species

Lambert, H. and Emam, W., (2024). Dying for a canape: the welfare implications associated with both traditional and “ethical” production of caviar from sturgeon. Frontiers in Animal Science, 5, p.1432765.

Lopez, A.; Vasconi, M.; Bellagamba, F.; Mentasti, T.; Moretti, V.M. (2020). Sturgeon Meat and Caviar Quality from Different Cultured Species. Fishes 2020, 5, 9.

McBain, W. (2020). Harvest on ice at Africa’s first caviar farm. African Business. Available at: https://african.business/2020/06/economy/harvest-on-ice-at-africas-first-caviar-farm

Onofri, L., Pulcini, D., Martini, A., Martinoli, M., Napolitano, R., Tonachella, N. and Capoccioni, F., (2024). Economic Analysis of Sturgeon Farming and Caviar Production: A Case Study of an Italian Fish Farm. Water, 16(18), p.2618. Available at: https://www.mdpi.com/2073-4441/16/18/2618

Rova Caviar: https://rova-caviar.com/en-FR/categories/caviars

Tavakoli, S.; Luo, Y.; Regenstein, J.M.; Daneshvar, E.; Bhatnagar, A.; Tan, Y.; Hong, H. (2021). Sturgeon, Caviar, and Caviar Substitutes: From Production, Gastronomy, Nutrition, and Quality Change to Trade and Commercial Mimicry. Rev. Fish. Sci. Aquac. 29, 753–768.

Yom Din, G.; Degani, G. (2020). Economic Evaluation of Early Sex Determination for Farmed Russian Sturgeon: The Case of Northern Israel. Mod. Econ. 11, 1977–1983