Type | Subsidiary company |
---|---|
Industry | Food processing, fishing |
Founded | 1986 |
Headquarters | , |
Area served | Australia, New Zealand, Asia |
Products | Processed salmon products |
Number of employees | 700 [1] |
Parent | JBS S.A. |
Website | www |
Huon Aquaculture is a large aquaculture and food processing enterprise located in Tasmania, Australia. Founded in 1986, Huon has grown to become the second largest salmon producer in the state, after ASX-listed Tassal; it employs 487 Tasmanians and produces 25,000 tonnes of salmon annually. [2] It became a subsidiary of the Brazilian meat processing company JBS S.A. in November 2021. [3]
Huon operates fish pens in Storm Bay, off Bruny Island, Macquarie Harbour, near Strahan, and Hideaway Bay, near Dover, a fish processing, packing and value-added facility in Parramatta Creek, Tasmania.
In 2020, Huon Aquaculture was convicted of environmental breaches in regard to its operations at Whale Point and fined $40,000. [4]
As of 2021, Huon has additional assets in Western Australia including a processing facility in Perth and a 2,200 hectare lease in the Mid West aquaculture zone. [5]
It was a majority family and employee owned company listed on the Australian Securities Exchange, [6] but was acquired by JBS in November 2021.
Aquaculture, also known as aquafarming, is the controlled cultivation ("farming") of aquatic organisms such as fish, crustaceans, mollusks, algae and other organisms of value such as aquatic plants. Aquaculture involves cultivating freshwater, brackish water and saltwater populations under controlled or semi-natural conditions, and can be contrasted with commercial fishing, which is the harvesting of wild fish. Mariculture, commonly known as marine farming, refers specifically to aquaculture practiced in seawater habitats and lagoons, as opposed to freshwater aquaculture. Pisciculture is a type of aquaculture that consists of fish farming to obtain fish products as food.
Mariculture or marine farming is a specialized branch of aquaculture involving the cultivation of marine organisms for food and other animal products, in enclosed sections of the open ocean, fish farms built on littoral waters, or in artificial tanks, ponds or raceways which are filled with seawater. An example of the latter is the farming of marine fish, including finfish and shellfish like prawns, or oysters and seaweed in saltwater ponds. Non-food products produced by mariculture include: fish meal, nutrient agar, jewellery, and cosmetics.
Tasmania is an island state of Australia. It is located 240 kilometres (150 miles) to the south of the Australian mainland, separated from it by the Bass Strait, with the archipelago containing the southernmost point of the country. The state encompasses the main island of Tasmania, the 26th-largest island in the world, and the surrounding 1000 islands. It is Australia's least populous state, with 569,825 residents as of December 2021. The state capital and largest city is Hobart, with around 40 percent of the population living in the Greater Hobart area. This makes it Australia's most decentralised state.
Lake Pedder, once a glacial outwash lake, is a man-made impoundment and diversion lake located in the southwest of Tasmania, Australia. In addition to its natural catchment from the Frankland Range, the lake is formed by the 1972 damming of the Serpentine and Huon rivers by the Hydro Electric Commission of Tasmania for the purposes of hydroelectric power generation.
Macquarie Harbour is a shallow fjord in the West Coast region of Tasmania, Australia. It is approximately 315 square kilometres (122 sq mi), and has an average depth of 15 metres (49 ft), with deeper places up to 50 metres (160 ft). It is navigable by shallow-draft vessels. The main channel is kept clear by the presence of a rock wall on the outside of the channel's curve. This man-made wall prevents erosion and keeps the channel deep and narrow, rather than allowing the channel to become wide and shallow. A reported Aboriginal name for the harbour is Parralaongatek.
Huon Valley Council is a local government body in Tasmania, covering most of the south of the state. Huon Valley is classified as a rural local government area and has a population of 17,219, towns and localities of the region include Cygnet, Dover, Franklin, Geeveston, Southport and the largest principal town, Huonville.
Smithton is a town on the far north-west coast of Tasmania, Australia. It lies on the Bass Highway, 85 km north-west of Burnie. At the 2021 census, Smithton had a population of 3,934. Smithton is the administrative centre of the Circular Head Council.
Gunns Limited was a major forestry enterprise located in Tasmania, Australia. It had operations in forest management, woodchipping, sawmilling and veneer production. The company was placed into liquidation in March 2013.
The Tasmanian giant freshwater crayfish, also called Tasmanian giant freshwater lobster, is the largest freshwater invertebrate and the largest freshwater crayfish species in the world. The species is only found in the rivers below 400 metres (1,300 ft) above sea level in northern Tasmania, an island-state of Australia. It is listed as an endangered species on the IUCN Red List due to overfishing and habitat degradation, and it has been prohibited to catch the crayfish since 1998.
Tassal is a Tasmanian-based Australian salmon farming company founded in 1986. It was listed on the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) from 2003 until 2022. Tassal is the largest producer of Tasmanian grown Atlantic salmon, supplying salmon to both domestic and international markets. In November 2022, it was purchased by Cooke Seafood of Canada and delisted from the ASX.
The D'Entrecasteaux Channel is a body of water located between Bruny Island and the south-east of the mainland of Tasmania, Australia. The channel is the mouth for the estuaries of the Derwent and the Huon Rivers and empties into the Tasman Sea of the South Pacific Ocean. It was sighted by Abel Tasman in 1642 and surveyed in 1792 by Bruni d'Entrecasteaux.
The Huon Valley, or simply the Huon, is a valley and geographic area located in southern Tasmania, Australia. The largest town is Huonville, with other smaller towns spread across the area. It includes Australia's most southern permanent settlement at Southport. The Huon Valley Council area had a population of 15,140 in 2011. Famed for its apple growing, the Valley was first settled by British colonists in the 1820s; prior to settlement the Huon Valley area was inhabited by the Mouheneenner, Nuenonne, Mellukerdee and Lyluequonny people.
Port Davey is an oceanic inlet located in the south west region of Tasmania, Australia.
Plenty is a rural locality in the local government area (LGA) of Derwent Valley in the South-east LGA region of Tasmania. The locality is about 9 kilometres (5.6 mi) north-west of the town of New Norfolk. The 2016 census recorded a population of 93 for the state suburb of Plenty. It is a small locality and the name of a tributary river on the south side of the River Derwent in the Derwent Valley.
JBS S.A. is a Brazilian company that is the largest meat processing enterprise in the world, producing factory processed beef, chicken and pork, and also selling by-products from the processing of these meats. It is headquartered in São Paulo. It was founded in 1953 in Anápolis, Goiás.
Aquaculture started to take off in New Zealand in the 1980s. It is dominated by mussels, oysters and salmon. In 2007, aquaculture generated about NZ$360 million in sales on an area of 7,700 hectares. $240 million was earned in exports.
Aquaculture in Australia is the country's fastest-growing primary industry, accounting for 34% of the total gross value of production of seafood. 10 species of fish are farmed in Australia, and production is dominated by southern bluefin tuna, Atlantic salmon and barramundi. Mud crabs have also been cultivated in Australia for many years, sometimes leading to over-exploitation. Traditionally, this aquaculture was limited to pearls, but since the early 1970s, there has been significant research and commercial development of other forms of aquaculture, including finfish, crustaceans, and molluscs.
Primo Foods, is an Australian food and beverage company based in Chullora in Western Sydney, is the largest producer of ham, bacon and smallgoods in the Southern Hemisphere.
The Brooke Street Pier is a floating pontoon building at Sullivans Cove in the waterfront area of the city of Hobart, Tasmania, Australia. It was constructed in 2014–15 at a cost of A$13 million. It weighs 5,300 tonnes and was Australia's largest floating building upon completion. It is connected to the Hobart shore at Franklin Wharf, near the base of Brooke Street. Primarily a ferry terminal, the architect has described it as a "tourism transport hub".
Risdon Zinc Works is a major zinc refinery located in Lutana, a suburb of Hobart, Tasmania, Australia. The smelter is one of the world’s largest in terms of production volume, producing over 280,000 tonnes annually of high-grade zinc, primarily as die-cast alloys and continuous galvanising-grade alloys. These products are exported for global markets and utilised in a wide range of industries and products, from building and infrastructure to transportation, business equipment, communications, electronics, and consumer goods. The facility produces zinc using the Roast, Leach, Electrowinning (RLE) method, creating leach byproducts, including cadmium, gypsum, copper sulphate, lead sulphate, sulphuric acid, paragoethite and leach concentrate. The refinery has been owned and operated by the global multi-metals business Nyrstar since 2007. Nyrstar Hobart works closely with the Nyrstar Port Pirie multi-metals smelter in South Australia. The facility is Tasmania's largest exporter, contributing 25% of the state's overall export value in 2013.