National Fisheries Development Program at the Ministry of Environment, Water and Agriculture in cooperation with Saudi Aquaculture Society, and the French Embassy in Riyadh, held a workshop on "Developing the Algae Industry in Saudi Arabia" on Monday, July 14, 1439H, corresponding to July 16, 2018.

The workshop was held under the patronage of His Excellency the Deputy Minister of Agriculture Eng. Ahmed bin Saleh Al-Ayedah and the presence of the Ambassador of the French Republic in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia François Goite in participation of a number of academic and research institutions and a number of private French companies involved in the algae industry.

The workshop aims to provide a sustainable system for the production of food, medicine and feed in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia according to the sustainable development in water, energy and food as one of the important issues in the vision of the Kingdom 2030.

From his part, H.E. Eng. Ahmed Al-Ayedah, the Deputy Minsiter of Agriculture, expressed his happiness at this workshop, which comes as a culmination of the joint cooperation between the two sides and activating the memorandum of understanding signed in April this year to transfer technologies and knowledge for the algae production, on the sidelines of the visit of His Royal Highness Prince Mohammed bin Salman bin Abdulaziz, Crown Prince and Deputy Prime Minister, which aims to build a new partnership that contributes to the promotion of investment in the Kingdom in line with the vision of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia 2030.

H.E. added that this workshop is the first of its kind, which brings together more than 20 private companies from Saudi and French companies and a number of other entities, which are distributed in a number of fields, including research and development, energy, chemicals, agriculture, aquaculture, feed production, medical and cosmetic industries. In order to build a real partnership between the two sides to promote and support investment opportunities in the fields of algae production in the Kingdom through the transfer of modern technologies for the production of algae and to benefit from the comparative advantages of the Kingdom, which has all the conditions and natural and climatic potential for the industry of aquaculture algae.

H.E. Dr. Ali Al Shaikhi, the CEO of the National Fisheries Development Program, said that the workshop is part of the efforts exerted by the program in cooperation with the Saudi Aquaculture Society and a number of bodies. Adding that algae farming industry is gaining significant importance for the Kingdom by replacing the algae protein as an alternative to fish powder in the feed industry, which is expanding day by day in the Kingdom due to the large expansion of the aquaculture sector, which aims to raise production to more than half a million tons by 2030.
Dr. Ali also stressed that algae have economic and other environmental aspects, including raising the quality of feed used in all agricultural sectors, and its entry into agricultural fertilizer industry and a number of medical and cosmetic industries, food supplements and other high-value-added materials,
The industry will also contribute to achieving significant economic returns by providing new jobs and contributing to the reduction of environmental impacts through the consumption of large quantities of carbon dioxide in algae farming operations.