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With the decline of wild stocks and commercial fishing, aquaculture industry must increases production to meet growing demand for aquatic products. However, its current reliance on fish meal and fish oils strongly constrains development of aquaculture industry. This is true in part on quantitative aspects (production quantities of fishmeal and fish oil will not increase) and also for image of aquaculture, regularly accused of plundering the seas. The substitution of marine-origin feeds by plant-origin feeds is an urgent need for sustainable development of aquaculture (through its three pillars, economic sustainability of company, limited environmental impact and acceptability Social aquaculture products). To allow effective substitution, the French companies of selection in fish farming, need to know the necessity or not to select fish specifically tailored to these new diets.

This project aims to answering the following questions:

• Does the fish selected on current diet rich in marine products (fish meal and oil) will be as efficient on diets based on plant products?
• Can we improve the selection process to produce fish with good performance (growth, feed efficiency, yield, organoleptic and nutritional quality) with feed containing few marine-origin products?
•   By which strategies combining genetic selection and definition of appropriate  feeding practice  can we optimize the capacity of farmed fish to provide a healthy and quality product for human consumption, in an economic performance and with minimal use of marine products ?

To answer these questions, the principal breeders of the three major species of French fish farming (trout, bass, sea bream) and a new promising species (meagre) uses the scientific and technologic skills of Ifremer, INRA, and Sysaaf. This project combines approaches in industry and experiments in experimental fish farm and laboratory

Partners

• Ferme Marine de Douhet
• Ecloserie Marine de Gravelines
• Ifremer
• Sysaaf
• Inra Jouy en Josas, Rennes (Jérôme Bugeon, Patrick Prunet), St Pée sur Nivelle et Sizun