Oceanus partners Shaw Investment Holdings, Chinese construction firm to enhance food security

MAINBOARD-LISTED Oceanus Group has partnered Shaw Investment Holdings and China Construction Seventh Engineering Division to tackle food security concerns from governments around the world.

On Monday, the seafood value chain manager announced in a post-market close filing that it has inked a memorandum of understanding with the two parties to jointly explore global aquaculture-related investment opportunities and development projects worth US$500 million.

Executive director and CEO of Oceanus Group Peter Koh said: "We believe this tripartite collaboration is well-positioned to capitalise on the bourgeoning aquaculture opportunities globally."

Separately, Oceanus also announced on Monday that it is on track with its upcoming Oceanus Aquapolis City project.

The project will "likely be located in the southern part of Singapore", Mr Koh told The Business Times in a phone interview on Monday.

It is a sea-based hi-tech aquaponics farm that aims to be the solution to food security and safety in Singapore and beyond, the group said.

It can expand to an area as big as 10 football fields or more depending on the consumption needs of each country, Mr Koh added.

"One of the reasons we want to do it in the sea is that 70 per cent of the world is covered by water. Land (space) is a problem...Basically, we're bringing land into sea."

Oceanus said that the project in its final stage of fruition will be worth "several hundred millions of dollars".

Combining hydroponics and aquaculture farming technologies, Oceanus said that the project is an environmentally friendly, multi-storey floating closed-contained platform for the production of fish and vegetables.

Oceanus closed unchanged at one Singapore cent on Monday.