242 Marine Macro- and Microalgae: An Overview
These funding efforts are continuing in Europe and other projects focusing on IMTA development are
ongoing, such as the IMTA EFFECT project (2016–2019), and INTEGRATE (Integrate Aquaculture:
an eco-innovative solution to foster sustainability in the Atlantic Area), launched in 2017. The IMTA
EFFECT project, funded by COFASP is assessing the efficiency of different IMTA systems, analyzing
nutrient and energy flows, and developing tools based on modelling to predict systems functioning.
Multitrophic marine systems and freshwater polyculture systems will be considered. This project also
addresses the perception of IMTA by stakeholders, through economic and social evaluation of ecological
services (http://www.agence-nationale-recherche.fr/Project-ANR-15-COFA-0001). The INTEGRATE
project gathered 19 partners from five countries to develop tools to improve competitiveness, as well as
the quality and public perception of IMTA aquaculture products. It includes the creation of a platform
for sectorial collaboration in the Atlantic area, for developing methods and technology, assessing
environmental impact, identifying bottlenecks, and designing a strategy for industrial upscaling of IMTA
in this region (http://www.atlanticarea.eu/news/40).
Other western countries such as Canada have been actively working to develop IMTA in order
to increase aquaculture profitability, environmental sustainability, and societal acceptability through
economic diversification by co-cultivating several value-added marine crops. Over the last decade, the
Canadian IMTA Network (CIMTAN) at the University of New Brunswick has been working with an
industrial partner, Cooke Aquaculture Inc., in Atlantic Canada to develop seaweed cultivation in IMTA
systems for their valorization using the integrated sequential biorefinery (ISBR) approach. This research/
industrial partnership is developing markets for the use of seaweed (kelp) in areas such as human
consumption, cosmetics, or fish feed, and also implementing eco-labeling and organic certification
(Chopin 2015).
Some of the conclusions from research projects are apparently rather straightforward, such as the
importance of choosing species that are endemic and present a good growth performance. In the case of
seaweed, species selection probably needs to be based on site specific testing, although some general
criteria may be used for pre-selection such as high nutrient uptake rate and efficiency, high growth rates,
the ability of sustaining stress due to cultivation conditions, and ease of cultivation (Neori et al. 2004;
Kang et al. 2013).
The reasons why IMTA is not still widely applied in western countries are manifold and related
to biological, ecological, technical, and socio-economic issues. Biological constraints are related to
stabilization of cultivation methods for seaweed, an important component in IMTA, namely development
of cultivars adapted to local conditions (Kim et al. 2017) and also a better understanding of cultivation
methods for benthic organisms (Hughes et al. 2016). One ecological issue is, for example, kelp cultivation
as the inorganic extractor since a seasonal mismatch exists between highest growth periods in fish and
seaweed. Fish grow faster in summer when the temperatures are higher whereas kelp present higher
growth rates in early spring when they need more nutrients (Broch et al. 2013). The solution may be to
select different seaweed species that grow well in the summer. Technical issues are related to structure
stability in more exposed off-shore sites, logistics for deployment and harvesting of seaweed and other
organisms, and drying of large amounts of seaweed biomass. Finally, another important issue that needs
to be handled is policy and regulations, by providing information based on scientific data to regulatory
bodies aiming to implement the IMTA licensing procedures, which account for IMTA specificities such as
species interactions and ecosystem-based management approaches to aquaculture (Chopin 2017).
If in western countries the concept of IMTA was developed as a strategy to overcome the negative
environmental impacts of intensive fish farming and at the same time diversify production, in the East,
as in China, integrated aquaculture has been practiced at the scale of whole coastal bays, with dozens of
species farmed in close proximity to each other. Sanggou Bay, located on the eastern tip of Shandong
Peninsula, China, is one example of this whole bay aquaculture. In this bay, more than 100 km
2
of a
total of 163 km
2
, are used for aquaculture, producing above 240,000 ton of seafood per year, including
kelp, scallops, oysters, abalone, and sea cucumbers (Fang et al. 2016). Although this practice started
as unintentional IMTA systems, integration of aquaculture using different species at the water body
scale are now viewed as a useful approach for IMTA in western regions, facilitating the management
of technical issues, such as spatial planning and species integration (Hughes et al. 2016). Nevertheless,
These funding efforts are continuing in Europe and other projects focusing on IMTA development are
ongoing, such as the IMTA EFFECT project (2016–2019), and INTEGRATE (Integrate Aquaculture:
an eco-innovative solution to foster sustainability in the Atlantic Area), launched in 2017. The IMTA
EFFECT project, funded by COFASP is assessing the efficiency of different IMTA systems, analyzing
nutrient and energy flows, and developing tools based on modelling to predict systems functioning.
Multitrophic marine systems and freshwater polyculture systems will be considered. This project also
addresses the perception of IMTA by stakeholders, through economic and social evaluation of ecological
services (http://www.agence-nationale-recherche.fr/Project-ANR-15-COFA-0001). The INTEGRATE
project gathered 19 partners from five countries to develop tools to improve competitiveness, as well as
the quality and public perception of IMTA aquaculture products. It includes the creation of a platform
for sectorial collaboration in the Atlantic area, for developing methods and technology, assessing
environmental impact, identifying bottlenecks, and designing a strategy for industrial upscaling of IMTA
in this region (http://www.atlanticarea.eu/news/40).
Other western countries such as Canada have been actively working to develop IMTA in order
to increase aquaculture profitability, environmental sustainability, and societal acceptability through
economic diversification by co-cultivating several value-added marine crops. Over the last decade, the
Canadian IMTA Network (CIMTAN) at the University of New Brunswick has been working with an
industrial partner, Cooke Aquaculture Inc., in Atlantic Canada to develop seaweed cultivation in IMTA
systems for their valorization using the integrated sequential biorefinery (ISBR) approach. This research/
industrial partnership is developing markets for the use of seaweed (kelp) in areas such as human
consumption, cosmetics, or fish feed, and also implementing eco-labeling and organic certification
(Chopin 2015).
Some of the conclusions from research projects are apparently rather straightforward, such as the
importance of choosing species that are endemic and present a good growth performance. In the case of
seaweed, species selection probably needs to be based on site specific testing, although some general
criteria may be used for pre-selection such as high nutrient uptake rate and efficiency, high growth rates,
the ability of sustaining stress due to cultivation conditions, and ease of cultivation (Neori et al. 2004;
Kang et al. 2013).
The reasons why IMTA is not still widely applied in western countries are manifold and related
to biological, ecological, technical, and socio-economic issues. Biological constraints are related to
stabilization of cultivation methods for seaweed, an important component in IMTA, namely development
of cultivars adapted to local conditions (Kim et al. 2017) and also a better understanding of cultivation
methods for benthic organisms (Hughes et al. 2016). One ecological issue is, for example, kelp cultivation
as the inorganic extractor since a seasonal mismatch exists between highest growth periods in fish and
seaweed. Fish grow faster in summer when the temperatures are higher whereas kelp present higher
growth rates in early spring when they need more nutrients (Broch et al. 2013). The solution may be to
select different seaweed species that grow well in the summer. Technical issues are related to structure
stability in more exposed off-shore sites, logistics for deployment and harvesting of seaweed and other
organisms, and drying of large amounts of seaweed biomass. Finally, another important issue that needs
to be handled is policy and regulations, by providing information based on scientific data to regulatory
bodies aiming to implement the IMTA licensing procedures, which account for IMTA specificities such as
species interactions and ecosystem-based management approaches to aquaculture (Chopin 2017).
If in western countries the concept of IMTA was developed as a strategy to overcome the negative
environmental impacts of intensive fish farming and at the same time diversify production, in the East,
as in China, integrated aquaculture has been practiced at the scale of whole coastal bays, with dozens of
species farmed in close proximity to each other. Sanggou Bay, located on the eastern tip of Shandong
Peninsula, China, is one example of this whole bay aquaculture. In this bay, more than 100 km
2
of a
total of 163 km
2
, are used for aquaculture, producing above 240,000 ton of seafood per year, including
kelp, scallops, oysters, abalone, and sea cucumbers (Fang et al. 2016). Although this practice started
as unintentional IMTA systems, integration of aquaculture using different species at the water body
scale are now viewed as a useful approach for IMTA in western regions, facilitating the management
of technical issues, such as spatial planning and species integration (Hughes et al. 2016). Nevertheless,