Offshore Aquaculture

On May 7, 2020, President Trump issued Executive Order 13921 “Promoting American Seafood Competitiveness and Economic Growth”, which included a directive for NOAA to establish an Offshore Aquaculture Opportunity Area (AOAI) in the Gulf of Mexico. NOAA has since moved swiftly to implement this directive. The Southern Shrimp Alliance has engaged extensively in this process working closely with NOAA in similarly innovative ways to deconflict offshore aquaculture development with the Gulf shrimp fisheries in order to preserve shrimp fishermen’s access to their traditional shrimp fishing grounds and to avoid and minimize any adverse environmental impacts of offshore aquaculture operations.