King Salmon buys new $8.14 million commercial site in Blenheim

Blue Endeavour is the world’s first attempt to farm the premium King (Chinook) salmon in exposed marine environments.

By Stephanie Ockhuysen of RNZ

NZ King Salmon has confirmed it has bought a multi-million dollar commercial site at Cloudy Bay Business Park in Blenheim.

Chief executive Carl Carrington said processing would eventually move to the new site from Nelson as the company looked to expand its Blue Endeavour project.

The company bought the site for $8.14 million.

Carrington said development was at least three years away, with no immediate changes for its Nelson factory or staff.

He said the new Blenheim site would create 70-100 jobs.

“It’s important for us to have a facility that’s capable of supporting our growth as we scale up the Blue Endeavour Open Ocean Farm, and Blenheim is the most viable site for us when we think about all of our fish are in the Marlborough Sounds, so it puts us nice and close to the fish,” he said.

“And that takes a lot of trucks off the road because at the moment we need to be transporting those fish over the Whangamoa Hills.

“It’s a very good position to be.

“It’s on State Highway 1, which then means when we distribute the fish out to markets, a lot of our fish goes out up to Auckland and out through Auckland Airport or up to Tauranga, out through the seaport or down south to Christchurch Airport and to Lyttelton.

“So being on State Highway 1 is just geographically a very nice spot to be.”

Carrington said Nelson would remain important for research, head office functions and processing.

The Blenheim deal is set to settle by October 7 and will be funded from existing cash.

Blue Endeavour is New Zealand’s first open ocean salmon farming initiative, spearheaded by New Zealand King Salmon.

It is the world’s first attempt to farm the premium King (Chinook) salmon in exposed marine environments.

- RNZ