Olhão council reports that the Transpolvo project to send live octopus to high value foreign markets in the Far East is nearly complete and the results are looking good.
Portugal’s Institute of the Sea (IPMA) has carried out tests to see if octopus can be transported over long distances while still alive and kept at low temperatures.
The two day journey to Japan and other countries in the Far East from Olhão’s fish farm pilot station leaves the octopus alive and fresh, just how the overseas market wants them in order to maximise value.
The IPMA has tried transporting the octopus in bulk at 10°C and there have been no ill effects.
The Transpolvo project has been funded by the PROMAR fisheries development programme with the support of the government fish body Docapesca, the Centre for Marine Science at the University of the Algarve, Armalgarve Octopus and various shipowner and fishermen associations.
Olhão's Tunipex company already grows tuna in fish farms off the Algarve's coastline and exports high quality fish to Japan so the route and expertise exists to export other high value seafood products.
In October 2014, the then Secretary of State for the Sea, Manuel Pinto de Abreu, announced that Portugal's marine industry is “committed” to finding and supplying Far Eastern buyers with octopus.
“We are convinced that the exporting of octopus to Asia is possible and until someone else tells us that it isn’t a good idea, we are going to pursue it,” declared the Secretary of State at Portimão's Mar Algarve Expo.
