Southern Institute of Technology (SIT) Management Team and the Environmental Management team visited New Zealand’s only pāua farm recently to explore potential opportunities for expanding the Environmental Management programme into aquaculture.
Located nearby at Ocean Beach, near Bluff, the visit to Foveaux Pāua farm took place on 16th October. Brae, Jen, and Uljwal from the Foveaux Pāua team gave a guided tour of the facility; the visitors were walked through the entire operation, from hatchery to grow-out systems.
The farm cultivates blackfoot pāua, which is native to New Zealand and the largest species here. In the farm environment, it takes approximately six years to grow a pāua to the size typically harvested in the wild. The farm sells the pāua at sizes ranging from 50–70 mm, with the 70 mm ones being around three years old. The group also learned that a new species of pāua was discovered in NZ just last year. Haliotis pirimoana, also known as Manawatāwhi pāua has only been found at Three Kings Islands, off the northern tip of the North Island and is a smaller species.
SIT Health and Humanities Head of Faculty, Julia Russell, said the visit was incredibly informative and inspiring, noting the land-based pāua farming system was quite different from what they had imagined—highly controlled and innovative. “The scale, sustainability, and innovation of the operation were impressive, and it provided valuable insights into how aquaculture could be further integrated into our programmes.”
Aquaculture is predicted to have a big, bright future in Southland as outlined in the regional plan, with potential jobs and growth for the province. “Foveaux Pāua are changing the way we harvest and grow food, and Southland is becoming a centre of innovation, ingenuity and research for aquaculture. We're excited to see what the future holds,” said Mrs Russell.
Mrs Russell added some of the group purchased pāua to take home and cook; the cooks were challenged to create and photograph their pāua dishes and send them to the rest of the teams.
SIT Operations Lead, Amanda Whitaker, was similarly impressed by the innovative, sustainable approach Foveaux Pāua farm had taken, and noted “Seeing the full pāua lifecycle was fascinating.”
Ms Whitaker said that Level 3 and Level 4 aquaculture qualifications have already been added to SIT’s programme portfolio (2023), and “…currently we are creating aquaculture short courses for secondary school students in 2026.”