Review of Scottish aquaculture innovation landscape and sme markets

Background

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  Initially, UK Government support was directed towards understanding life cycles for multiple species, including Atlantic salmon and bivalve shellfish (‘how to rear’). Innovations were mainly delivered via dedicated public sector research labs, e.g. Ministry of Agriculture Fisheries & Food (Conwy), Ardtoe Marine Farming Unit, Marine Laboratory Aberdeen. Typically, a ‘top-down’ approach during this era, because few established aquaculture companies in place to drive the direction of innovation.
  
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  Early pioneering investments by large non-aquaculture companies (e.g. Unilever) were instrumental in developing salmon farming capacity in Scotland, including the onset of in-house R&D (breeding, health management, nutrition). Elsewhere, farming of rainbow trout and bivalve shellfish (blue mussels, oysters) grew in the hands of numerous smaller businesses, without the consolidation that was later seen in the salmon sector.
  
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  In parallel, the foundation of the Institute of Aquaculture by veterinary researchers at University of Stirling marked a new, dedicated source of applied academic support for aquaculture operations emerging in Scotland and internationally. Researchers from other Scottish institutions also began engaging with the aquaculture sector, with notable centres of expertise developing at, for example, University of Aberdeen (fish physiology and immunology) and Scottish Association of Marine Science (aquaculture environmental interactions).
  
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  Rapid annual growth of salmon production, which began in the 1980s, was accompanied by global industry consolidation (both fish producers and supply chain), such that the number of Scottish production companies decreased significantly. Associated with this, the larger companies acquired improved in-house capacity for innovation, together with comprehensive global collaborative R&D networks. Public sector innovations to farm marine fish species (e.g. turbot, halibut, cod) led to limited commercial uptake, although there has recently been a resurgence around cleaner fish production for the control of sea lice.
  
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  Beginning in the 1990s, UK Government institutions, north and south, began divesting in dedicated aquaculture R&D facilities and associated expertise, concentrating instead on statutory responsibilities around licencing, control of pathogens/pests and aquaculture environmental impacts.
  
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  This trend continued following the switch to government agency status (e.g. CEFAS Weymouth; Fisheries Research Services Aberdeen), with devolution further affecting the ability/willingness of non-Scottish organisations to spend resources north of the border. At around the same time, the Sea Fish Industry Authority (ex-Whitefish Authority) divested in its aquaculture R&D operation at Ardtoe.
  
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  One result of government downscaling was to increase the importance of aquaculture R&D resources within Scottish universities, involving contract service provision to aquaculture businesses and collaborative research partnerships supported by the likes of the EC Framework and Horizon 2020 programmes, RCUK and Technology Strategy Board (now Innovate UK). All amid increasing global competition for access to companies, given the access that large aquaculture businesses have to research resources beyond Scotland.
  
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  Unsurprisingly, the contraction of dedicated UK public support for aquaculture innovation affected Scottish SMEs (both producers and supply chain) more than larger aquaculture businesses.
  

Bringing things up to date, the innovation needs of the Scottish aquaculture sector were the subject of a 2016 review: http://scottishaquaculture.com/new-innovation-roadmap-outlines-pathway-for-scottish-aquaculture-growth/

Aquaculture R&D infrastructure in Scotland and the potential for a centre of innovation excellence was also reviewed in 2016: http://scottishaquaculture.com/industry-wide-support-for-a-centre-of-innovation-excellence-says-study/

Current sources of support for aquaculture innovation in Scotland

Comprehensive, up-to-date links to EC funding sources can be found at the Scotland Europa website: https://www.funding-portal.eu/. https://www.funding-portal.eu/.

Selected programmes relevant to Scottish aquaculture are outlined below:


Horizon 2020 (H2020)

H2020 is the latest EC research and innovation programme (value approx. €80 billion, 2014-2020), succeeding the long-established Framework Programme (FP1-FP7, 1984-2013). Since the 1990s, these various EC programmes have supported Scottish aquaculture innovation by including regionally-relevant topics within broader collaborative projects (Scottish academic institutions and businesses participating as project partners). A database of aquaculture-themed projects from FP5 through to FP7 can be found at: http://www.eatip.eu/default.asp?SHORTCUT=410, relevant topics include breeding technologies, fish health and nutrition, and shellfish food safety.

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  ‘Food Security, Sustainable Agriculture and Forestry, Marine, Maritime and Inland Water Research and the Bioeconomy’
  
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  See: https://ec.europa.eu/programmes/horizon2020/en/h2020-section/food-security-sustainable-agriculture-and-forestry-marine-maritime-and-inland-water
  

Of the 2,847 projects awarded to July 2017, just 24 of these are in Scotland, one of which relates directly to aquaculture (Otaq Ltd, ‘Fishstimator’).

Scottish organisations have participated in a number of aquaculture-linked Interreg projects, for example cleaner fish cultivation, ‘EcoFish’ (NPA programme, see: http://www.northernperiphery.eu/en/projects/show/&tid=18) and marine algae production for bioenergy, ‘BioMara’ (http://www.biomara.org/).

UK Government supports the business innovation landscape via the following organisations:

Innovate UK is the national body supporting innovation across all business sectors and geographic locations (see https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/innovate-uk). The tools and programmes offered by the organisation include Collaborative Research and Development, the Small Business Research Initiative, Knowledge Transfer Partnerships, Launchpad competitions and overseas missions.

Current investment priorities are focused around emerging and enabling technologies, health and life sciences, infrastructure systems, and manufacturing and materials. Innovate UK also operate an open competition for innovation within any tech base or sector in the UK.

Significant aquaculture-themed projects have previously been funded by Innovate UK, e.g. ‘beans4feeds’ (http://beans4feeds.hutton.ac.uk/) and recent directed competitions have included aquaculture elements, see: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/funding-competition-innovation-in-health-and-life-sciences-round-2/competition-brief-innovation-in-health-and-life-sciences-round-2

Networking is an important function of Innovate UK, delivered via a free-to-join Knowledge Transfer Network that incorporates sectoral interest areas (https://ktn-uk.co.uk/). Most aquaculture activity sits within the Agri-food interest group. Among the KTN’s responsibilities is networking to other funders including SAIC.

Innovate UK also manages several EC support programmes, namely:

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  Eureka Eurostars https://www.eurostars-eureka.eu/
  
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  Enterprise Europe Network http://www.enterprise-europe.co.uk/ (note: in Scotland the EEN is managed by Scottish Enterprise and Highlands and Islands Enterprise http://www.enterprise-europe-scotland.com/)
  

Around 2013, Innovate UK established a network of 10 Catapult Centres in specific high technology sectors, to promote innovation through business-led collaboration between scientists, engineers and market opportunities (https://catapult.org.uk/). Rather than funding innovation via a grant programme, each Catapult Centre is expected to raise funds equally from three sources: business-funded R&D contracts; collaborative applied R&D projects from UK and Europe (H2020); and core UK public funding.

The Satellite Applications Catapult (https://sa.catapult.org.uk/) has had some engagement with the Scottish aquaculture industry to explore the potential to integrate satellite services for enhanced coastal environmental monitoring, and also with a view to supporting planned offshore aquaculture operations.

Agri-Tech Innovation Centres

Based on a similar funding model to Catapults, the UK Government also recently established four Centres for Agri-Tech Innovation (https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/centres-for-agricultural-innovation/centres-for-agricultural-innovation). Two of these have clear potential to engage with the Scottish aquaculture sector, although their main focus is agriculture:

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  Centre for Innovation Excellence in Livestock (CIEL) http://www.cielivestock.co.uk/
  
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  The Agricultural Engineering Precision Innovation Centre (Agri-Epi Centre) https://www.agri-epicentre.com/
  

RCUK is a strategic partnership of seven individual UK research councils that coordinate and fund research in the arts, humanities, science and engineering.

Securing RCUK funding is a high priority for UK academics, including those in Scottish institutions. Both directed and open (responsive mode) calls for proposals are issued by the research councils each year.

The most relevant research councils to the aquaculture sector are:

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  Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC)
  
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  Natural Environment Research Council (NERC)
  
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  Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC)
  

Historically, research excellence rather than innovation has been the key driver for the UK research councils, confining the volume, scope and TRL of aquaculture-themed projects. However, socio-economic impact has assumed greater importance recently, leading to the formation of an Aquaculture Research Collaborative Hub (ARCH-UK), jointly funded by BBSRC and NERC (see: http://www.bbsrc.ac.uk/innovation/collaboration/collaborative-programmes/uk-aquaculture-initiative/). This new £600k initiative provides resources for industry-academia collaborative research on finfish and shellfish aquaculture (note: ARCH-UK website still in development at time of writing).

The key regional organisations supporting business innovation are:

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  The Scottish Funding Council which provides core funding for all further and higher education establishments in Scotland. SFC also supports specific programmes to improve business competitiveness via access to academic expertise.
  
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  Highlands and Islands Enterprise and Scottish Enterprise are the two regional business development agencies in Scotland, which include innovation support as part of their offering. (Note: most aquaculture production in Scotland occurs within the HIE region, while equipment manufacturing, technology companies and food processors extend into the SE region.) Among their responsibilities, these enterprise agencies manage the EC Enterprise Europe Network in Scotland.
  
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  Marine Scotland is the branch of Scottish Government responsible for marine science, planning, policy development, management and monitoring compliance. Marine Scotland’s current role in supporting aquaculture innovation derives from regional management of the European Maritime and Fisheries Fund (EMFF).
  

Further information on each organisation and their support mechanisms is presented below.

SFC is the public body charged with funding Scotland's further and higher education institutions, including its 25 colleges and 19 universities. The SFC has invested approx. £120 million in funding through 2013 to 2018 towards eight sectoral Innovation Centres whose purpose is to fund collaboration between universities and businesses, and to promote entrepreneurship. This Innovation Centres programme is a joint initiative between SFC, SE and HIE.

The Innovation Centres are:

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  Scottish Aquaculture Innovation Centre (SAIC) http://scottishaquaculture.com/
  
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  Centre for Sensor and Imaging Systems (CENSIS)
  
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  Construction Scotland Innovation Centre (CSIC)
  
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  Digital Health and Care Institute (DHI)
  
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  Industrial Biotechnology Innovation Centre (IBioIC)
  
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  Oil and Gas Innovation Centre (OGIC)
  
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  Stratified Medicine (SMS-IC)
  
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  The Data Lab
  

This programme was reviewed independently in 2016, with a key recommendation to extend resourcing for each innovation centre to 10 years, see: http://www.sfc.ac.uk/Priorities/Innovation/IndependentICReview/ICReview.aspx As of July 2017, discussions have begun between the ICs and SFC, SE and HIE, to negotiate the next phase of funding.

SAIC was approved for funding in 2014, to the value of £11.1m over five years. SAIC has a specific innovation focus based on the following aquaculture priorities:

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  Environmental and health challenges, particularly sea lice and gill disease
  
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  Feeds that optimise fish health and nutrition
  
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  Unlocking additional capacity for aquaculture development through innovative, evidence-based approaches
  
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  Establishing a reliable supply of mussel spat.
  

Along with funding innovation projects, SAIC supports knowledge exchange, sectoral skills and training. International cooperation is also important, as illustrated by joint organisation of the 2017 International Cleaner Fish Summit with the Norwegian Seafood Research Fund (FHF) http://scottishaquaculture.com/international-cleaner-fish-summit-2017/.

The Interface programme, established in 2005, supports academic engagement across all business sectors in Scotland (http://www.interface-online.org.uk/). Services offered to SMEs include academic partner searching, financial support for business-academia collaboration via Innovation Vouchers, business intelligence and knowledge exchange. A key target is to shorten the time and money that micro-businesses and SMEs spend on developing new products or searching for partners individually.

Details on the SFC Innovation Voucher scheme can be found at: http://www.interface-online.org.uk/how-we-can-help/funding

Besides the voucher system, Interface also provides support via the Interface Food and Drink Competition, encouraging partnership between industry and academia. Recent competition winners include aquaculture producers: http://www.interface-online.org.uk/news/interface-food-drink-competition-winning-tail

HIE's role is to develop sustainable economic growth across the rural Highlands and Islands region, which covers more than half of Scotland and is home to around 450,000 people (http://www.hie.co.uk/). HIE supports growth of business and social enterprise clients via an account management model in order to accelerate growth in turnover, profitability, wage levels, exports and GVA in the HIE area.

HIE (and its predecessor, Highlands & Islands Development Board) has been very important throughout the development of the Scottish aquaculture industry, providing business grants and loans and co-funding R&D on topics of common interest (see timeline at: http://timeline.hie.co.uk/stories/food-drink-and-fisheries/).

Of the eight growth sectors currently supported by HIE (http://www.hie.co.uk/growth-sectors/), most aquaculture engagement takes place via the food and drink sector (http://news.hie.co.uk/all-news/growing-our-appetite-for-food-drink-innovation/). Most recently, HIE launched a new aquaculture innovation programme in partnership with SAIC during 2017 (http://news.hie.co.uk/all-news/aquaculture-supply-chain-1m-innovation-fund-opens/). This £1m, 30-month pilot programme is directed at SMEs, encompassing all sections of the aquaculture supply chain.

Scottish Enterprise is Scotland's largest economic development agency and a non-departmental public body of the Scottish Government. SE priorities are focused around Internationalisation, Innovation, Investment and Inclusive Growth (https://www.scottish-enterprise.com/about-us).

Information on SE’s schemes to support business innovation, including R&D grants and High-Growth Spinout Programme, can be found at: https://www.scottish-enterprise.com/open-innovation. SE also supports a SMART Scotland programme via the European Structural and Investment Fund, see: https://www.scottish-enterprise.com/services/develop-new-products-and-services/smart-scotland/overview.


Marine Scotland

Marine Scotland is a civil service directorate within the Scottish Government, responsible for marine science, planning, policy development, management and monitoring compliance. The organisation manages Scotland’s €67 million core funding allocation under the European Maritime and Fisheries Fund (EMFF), which supports the EU's maritime and fisheries policies for 2014-2020. EMFF applications were opened in Scotland in 2016.

As noted above, Scottish universities and research institutions play an important role in aquaculture innovation, collaborating with aquaculture businesses via dedicated innovation funds (SAIC, Interface, Innovate UK, H2020, etc.) and engaging businesses in basic research (RCUK, Norwegian Research Council and other sponsors), as well as providing 1-2-1 contract research services to aquaculture businesses.

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  Environment theme (includes food science & innovation) https://www.abertay.ac.uk/research/environment/
  

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  School of applied sciences (includes marine parasitology) http://www.napier.ac.uk/about-us/our-schools/school-of-applied-sciences
  
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  School of engineering and the built environment http://www.napier.ac.uk/about-us/our-schools/school-of-engineering-and-the-built-environment
  
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  St Abbs Marine Station (joint with Heriot-Watt University) http://marinestation.co.uk/
  

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  Biological & Biomedical Sciences (includes virology & microbiology) http://www.gcu.ac.uk/hls/aboutus/ourdepartments/lifesciences/
  

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  Institute of Mechanical, Process and Energy Engineering (includes bio-process engineering)
  https://www.hw.ac.uk/schools/engineering-physical-sciences/institutes/mechanical-process-energy-engineering.htm
  
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  Centre for Marine Biodiversity and Biotechnology (includes fish physiology and applied marine environmental science) https://www.hw.ac.uk/study/uk/postgraduate/centre-marine-biodiversity-biotechnology.htm
  
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  Lyell Centre* (marine ecosystems science)
  http://www.lyellcentre.ac.uk/home.html
  
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  St Abbs Marine Station (joint with Edinburgh Napier University)
  http://marinestation.co.uk/
  

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  Land and crop science, including aqua-feed raw materials) http://www.hutton.ac.uk/
  

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  FRS Marine Laboratory, Aberdeen & FRS Freshwater Laboratory, Pitlochry http://www.biodundee.co.uk/Listing/754/FRS+Freshwater+Laboratory/
  
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  Expertise and responsibilities include fish health, marine spatial planning, environmental monitoring
  
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  Facilities include Fish Veterinary Aquaria
  

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  Scottish Centre for Food Development and Innovation https://www.qmu.ac.uk/research-and-knowledge-exchange/research-centres-institutes-and-groups/scottish-centre-for-food-development-and-innovation/
  

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  Energy, Environment and Sustainability (includes environmental technologies and cyanobacteria monitoring/control) http://www.rgu.ac.uk/research/research-home/design-and-technology-research/research-in-engineering/research-in-engineering
  

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  Animal & veterinary sciences https://www.sruc.ac.uk/info/120061/animal_and_veterinary_sciences
  
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  Future farming systems (includes epidemiology research unit)
  https://www.sruc.ac.uk/info/120060/future_farming_systems
  

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  Scottish Fish Immunology Research Centre https://www.abdn.ac.uk/sfirc/
  

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  School of science & engineering https://www.dundee.ac.uk/scienceengineering/
  
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  School of life sciences http://www.lifesci.dundee.ac.uk/
  

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  Roslin Institute (animal sciences, includes salmon breeding and genetics of disease resistance) http://www.ed.ac.uk/roslin
  

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  The Royal (Dick) School of Veterinary Studies http://www.ed.ac.uk/vet
  
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  School of Engineering (includes Flowave ocean simulator) https://www.eng.ed.ac.uk/
  

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  School of engineering (includes environmental microbiology) http://www.gla.ac.uk/schools/engineering/
  
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  Institute of Biodiversity Animal Health and Comparative Medicine http://www.gla.ac.uk/researchinstitutes/bahcm/
  
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  School of veterinary medicine http://www.gla.ac.uk/schools/vet/
  

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  North Atlantic Fisheries College (marine hatchery technologies) https://www.nafc.uhi.ac.uk/
  
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  Scottish Association for Marine Science* (marine biology and applied marine sciences, including aquaculture environmental impacts and multi-trophic aquaculture) https://www.sams.ac.uk/
  
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  Centre for Health Science (includes lipidomics research) http://www.centreforhealthscience.com/
  

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  Scottish Oceans Institute (marine biology and applied marine sciences, including marine mammal deterrent technologies) http://soi.st-andrews.ac.uk/
  

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  Multidisciplinary Institute of Aquaculture http://www.aqua.stir.ac.uk/, encompassing:
  
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    Breeding and genetics
    
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    Nutrition
    
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    Health
    
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    Welfare and behaviour
    
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    Aquaculture systems.
    
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  Facilities include Marine Environmental Research Laboratory.
  

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  Chemical and process engineering https://www.strath.ac.uk/engineering/chemicalprocessengineering/
  

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  Naval architecture, ocean & marine engineering https://www.strath.ac.uk/engineering/navalarchitectureoceanmarineengineering/
  
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  Medical devices and diagnostics https://www.strath.ac.uk/research/subjects/biomedicalengineering/medicaldevicesdiagnostics/
  

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  Infection and Microbiology Research Group (includes amoeba expertise) https://www.uws.ac.uk/research/research-institutes/science-and-sport/infection-and-microbiology/
  
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  Centre for Environmental Research (includes ecotoxicology) https://www.uws.ac.uk/research/research-institutes/science-and-sport/centre-for-environmental-research/
  

Scottish Universities Research Pools

The most relevant research pool for the aquaculture sector is Marine Alliance for Science and Technology for Scotland (MASTS), which incorporates an academic-led aquaculture forum http://www.masts.ac.uk/