Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

As I said, that is a question for them to answer.



More than likely so. If you consider that every tank, every hole comes with a labor input and labor in this country add significantly to the costs of any operation. If you are not getting the maximum out of each area for that labor input how can it be viable?



Again I can not speak for Nick on his operations, though like many farmers, production costs are not usually public. Though the DPI publish industry profiles like the following for last year.

http://www.dpi.nsw.gov.au/__data/assets ... 9-2010.pdf

The production numbers of barra for the state from that report:
Freshwater fish barramundi, 6 Farms licensed (not necessarily growing), 85,500 tonne produced at an average price of $12.23 per kg. I met with Nick a few weeks back and he advised they produce 600kg per week or 31.2tonne per year (36.5% of the states production).

So from we know, or can extrapolate.... the poster of the question should be able to get a sense of scale, and costs... with pursuing "commercialisation"...

I expect the first response to the OP will be the better option. I did not realise where the OP was from.

when it comes to commercial viability there are a few main variable to consider.

1. access of building materials. since the construction budget and upkeep is going to depend on the cost of materials, building these facilities in the middle of no where just because the land is cheap is not such a good idea. also, most of the best places for commercial systems would be located in or around the tropics, and most of the tropics are located in 2nd and 3rd world countries where materials can be scarce...

2. labor costs. i mentioned above that the cost of materials in 2nd world countries could be problematic, but this could be offset by the long term costs of labor... so, if building the system is going to cost you an extra 100K to build but will save you 500k over 5 years... this should be considered. the problem here is normally in places where labor is cheap, the demand for fresh produce is low driving the price way down... there's only a few places in the world where you can still get a premium on produce price and still get a low wage labor force... think india, asia, and africa....

3. market demand.... se the back half of the above statement... it's not going to matter if you can grow a million pounds of lettuce if you can't sell the stuff.

4. weather. aim for the tropics with low sever storm occurrences... otherwise you're looking at building greenhouses to maintain environmental stability. this would mean a higher construction cost, and a higher long term running cost.

there are other minor variables like proximity to large cities causing your system pH to rise due to acid rain and your regions bug problems, and climate swings, and regional looting issues, and import/ export tax, and accessibility of fish feed, cost of electricity, and cost of fresh water and frequency of rain fall... but really i don't want to dedicate 3 hours to this one post....

the point is there are a lot of pros and cons when it comes to building a commercial system, and for those that choose not to weigh their options before building a system... well... they shouldn't be surprised that they failed... but, there are a few places where the pro's out weigh the con's just enough to make these system work. granted you'll be exploiting the labor force of a third world country because the 1st would minimum wage base is too high to attain suitable profit margins... but that comes with the territory...

HI Polta,
That place I think about Thailand, my country.
But the place like that you will have a lot of dirt garden competitor also.
You are right, there are too many pro's and con's to be considered.

you're right about the dirt garden competition, but the yield rates of aquaponics, and the speed of growth rates will be able to out do the dirt gardens. even on a hybrid farm when you use system water a fertilizer for your ground plants, you'll see an increase in growth speed and yield.

really, just as long as your long terms running and labor costs are manageable then an elevated start up cost will not be that big of an issue, it's when the start up cost is cheap and the running cost is expensive that people run into problems. take the united states for example. the materials are less expensive so build a system so start up cost is cheap, but since the minimum wage bas is about to clear 8$ an hour, that makes your long term costs sky rocket. also most of the places that have the right weather for aquaponics are located where electricity is more expensive. you could supplement electricity with solar panels and wind mills, but those are some pretty big investments, and since the technology isn't main stream, they're still not working up to adequate levels to supply power consistently. i mean even in america where we have government kick backs and tax cuts for building solar panels, they are still pretty expensive, and even if you managed to get all the help from the government, you'll need about a dozen of them, or more, to power the blowers and the water pumps. because what energy was brought in a extra energy will be spent through out each night to keep the air and water flow running.

$8 an hour? Wow, that is cheap for a minimum wage...

Here in Australia it's $15.50, then all the other costs that go along with employing a person. +9% compulsory superannuation (about to become 12%), + 9 paid public holidays a year, +4 weeks paid annual leave, + 10 paid sick days a year, + workers compensation insurance which is about another 2-3%..

Minimum wage in Thailand is 250 baht a DAY (32 Baht/1 AUD)
Even that is rarely enforced.
My GF was a manager in a restaurant (she just quit)
Midday to 9pm - 170 baht a day!

with the 8$ an hour you also have to the about comparing that to the cost of living. i know that in hawaii that the 8$ federal minimum wouldnt stand, that's why burger flipper at the mcdonalds make 9.50 an hour due to the raise in cost of living...im not sure about the food and living prices in australia, but at first glance it would seem that the average price for goods is a bit higher than in the US. people always ask me "wasnt it expensive to live in hawaii?" and i tell them not really when you're getting paid an hawaiian wage... now living in ohio and going to vacation in hawaii is a different story... something strange that i noticed though... the cost of pepsi didnt change from mainland US to the hawaiian island... weird. lol.