MarePesca

Despite unique geographic location and climate, lack of infrastructure, capital investment, and technical expertise has limited the adoption of aquaculture in the Caribbean. MarePesca aims to address this problem through a microfinancing model that provides access to the capital needed to acquire equipment, and working closely with farmers to provide the necessary inputs and technical expertise, track of important operating parameters, and facilitate market access. Our goal is to develop a network of aquaculture farms around the Caribbean and the world that strengths employment opportunities for those employed in fisheries and involved in fish processing and retail; reduce overexploitation of seafood stocks; aid in food security; and foster economic growth and employment in many emerging markets.

With an increasing world population, guaranteeing food security in emerging markets is going to be a big challenge. Seafood could not only help satisfy future caloric demands, but it also provides a high-quality, nutritious alternative. However, for the past 30 years, climate change, pollution, and overfishing have threatened global seafood stocks. It is estimated that 70% of the world’s fisheries are now over-exploited. Aquaculture, the fastest growing segment of US agriculture for the past 15 years, has emerged to address issues of consistent seafood supply. However, lack of infrastructure, capital investment, and technical expertise has limited the adoption of aquaculture in the Caribbean. In fact, less than one percent of the world’s aquaculture is farmed in the Caribbean, where 30% of the population live below the poverty line. This has resulted in overfishing and a high dependence on seafood imports, which can be as high as 90% in many Caribbean islands.

MarePesca believes that empowering fishers is the key to unleashing the Caribbean’s full potential. Our solution is predicated on a microfinancing model that provides fishers with the right capital, equipment and technical expertise needed to operate sustainable aquafarms. Our team of aquaculture experts then works closely with fishers during the design, implementation and operation of off-shore and on-shore aquafarms; provide the necessary inputs; develop software solutions to facilitate tracking of important operating parameters; and link fishers with local vendors. This way we are developing a system changing framework that provides:

(1)   Financing solutions that provide access to the equipment and inputs necessary to engage in the growing aquaculture industry.

(2)   Technical solutions that tracks and analyzes important operating parameters to generate recommendations that improve the farm’s productivity.

(3)   Marketing solutions that increase market access through e-commerce, direct-to-consumer or value-added products.

Our solutions are targeted directly at coastal communities, whose livelihood is related to the fishing industry in the Caribbean. Currently, there are approximately 64,000 people directly employed in fisheries and an estimated 180,000 people involved in fish processing and retail in the region. We are designing our solutions to empower these communities by providing access to a growing industry (i.e. aquaculture), and thus increasing the access to good jobs, financial security and food resiliency, an issue that has intensified in recent years due to environmental challenges. For this reason, our team performed a detailed market research that consisted of interviews and product fit studies that allowed us to learn first-hand the needs and challenges of these communities. This is how we learned that, despite a deep interest, lack of capital and technical expertise limits their involvement in aquaculture, and thus formulated a microfinancing model that also combines a back-end solution to link fishers with aquaculture experts, who can provide targeted recommendations during the design, implementation and operation of each farm.

Once we understood that lack of infrastructure, capital investment, and technical expertise limited adoption of aquaculture in the Caribbean, it became clear that our mission should be centered around providing access to inputs, capital, and knowledge to improve adoption and productivity of aquaculture farms. Thus, we designed a framework that aim to accomplish this mission. Furthermore, as opposed to most aquaculture examples around the world, where farming has been dominated by large corporations, we believe that to foster economic growth in the region, our solutions should be centered around small-scale producers, who are the backbone of most coastal communities.

Today, aquaculture is dominated by industry giants, primarily located around Northern Europe and China, who operate large-scale farms and concentrate seafood production to only a few. MarePesca’s goal is to democratize aquaculture around the world by developing microfinancing solutions that allow anyone interested in aquaculture, willing to participate from our training programs, to start and operate their own seafood farm. We are the first and only company in the Western hemisphere to design and implement this model. Moreover, to further assist our microfarmers, we have developed technological and marketing solutions that fill needs in the industry, such as data acquisition, real-time feedback, and direct to consumer sales, with the goal of increasing productivity and revenue potential.

To improve the likelihood of success of our microfinancing model, we have developed an automation framework that allows us to track and analyze the important operating parameters of each farm (e.g. temperature, feed conversation rate, growth rate). This framework consists of hardware and software solutions. On the hardware side, we have design devices that allow us to house sensors and cameras in a way that protect the equipment without disturbing normal fish behavior. The data that is acquired is then analyzed through our software solutions that combine machine learning to model ideal farm behavior and provides actionable feedback (i.e. recommendations) to each farmer through web or mobile applications.

Although microfinancing has not been widely implemented in aquaculture, it has had positive results in other agricultural practices. An analogous example to our microfinancing and technological solutions is Twiga Foods (https://twiga.ke/) based in Kenya, who provides land-based farmers with the equipment and inputs required to operate small vegetable farms. We believe that MarePesca tackles the same problems but focused around the realities of sea-based farming.

The same way that humanity was able to leap into the civilizations we see today through the discovery of land-based farming, we believe that empowering fishers to start seeing the ocean for farming instead of hunting we can spark economic and social changes in the communities we will impact. Particularly in the Caribbean, where a large segment of the population (approximately 30%) still lives below the poverty line, the potential to develop a blue economy framed around marine aquaculture, the greatest natural resources for many island nations, can drastically impact the livelihood of millions.

Today we are serving 50 fishers who are actively participating from our pilot study. In one year, we aim to have expanded our framework of solutions to impact 100 restaurants with our farmed snapper, significantly improving food resiliency. And in five years we hope to have expanded to Jamaica and the Dominican Republic, and enroll close to 1000 fishers/farmers.

Today we are serving 50 fishers who are actively participating from our pilot study. In five years we hope to have expanded to Jamaica and the Dominican Republic, and enroll close to 1000 fishers/farmers producing close to 500,000 metric tons of red snapper for local and international consumption. To achieve this we will enlist the help of NGOs and other organizations such as the InterAmerican Development Bank. 

The biggest barriers to the expansion of aquaculture across the Caribbean is the variability in laws and regulations between the many jurisdictions. Furthermore, there is a lack of education in the region regarding the benefits and value of this growing industry. Thus, it is imperative that MarePesca works closely with government agencies to modify unnecessary regulations and educate the general public.

MarePesca aims to work closely with key NGOs, who work in this space, to modify unnecessary regulations and educate the general public.

Full-time staff: 2

Advisors: 2

David Miranda is founder and CEO of MarePesca. He holds a bachelors in science in Materials Science and Engineering from the MIT and a Ph.D. in Biomedical Engineering from the Harvard-MIT Program in Health, Sciences and Technology. David is motivated to address issues of food security, financial inclusion and global development.

Carlos Nieves is an investor, trader, analyst, electrical engineer, and project manager with more than 10 years developing teams and managing technology infrastructure, information systems, and consumer electronics products, projects and programs in the Americas, Europe and Asia. He has vast experience developing machine learning algorithms for applications in trading and marketing. Carlos is passionate to develop a strong blue economy in the Caribbean.

Rene Esteves, Ph.D. is an aquaculture specialist for the University of Puerto Rico. Previously he’s served as Puerto Rico’s Fisheries Liaison for the National Marine Fisheries Service of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. He is interested in developing small sustainable recirculating aquaculture projects that increase food security and offer alternative income for low-income rural coastal communities.

Daniel Benetti, Ph.D. is the director of aquaculture at the University of Miami. He has over 30 years of experience in aquaculture worldwide. He specializes in hatchery and grow-out technologies of marine finfish species, including cobia, snapper, tuna, mahimahi and flounder. His work is centered on innovative research to ensure that seafood production through mariculture is wholesome, environmentally sustainable and economic viable.

MarePesca currently has two groups for initial piloting:

• The University of Miami Aquaculture Program, which possesses a team of world experts in tropical seafood farming.
• The Puerto Rico Sea Grant College Program, which routinely interfaces with fishers across Puerto Rico for training opportunities.

Our business model consists on providing potential farmers with financing so they can acquire the equipment needed to operate sustainable micro-aquafarms of high-value seafood products. Further, MarePesca provides the necessary inputs; develops software solutions to facilitate tracking of important operating parameters; and links fishers with local vendors, by delivering farmed seafood products to restaurants and supermarkets at a price fair to everyone.

Being selected as a Solver will give us an avenue on which to present our solutions to the world. It will facilitate conversation with future NGO partners and allow us to fundraise the money we need to scale up.

We look to increase our online presence to allow us to raise the funds we need to accomplish our short and long-term goals.

We aim to partner with the MIT Legatum Center, who are the experts in social entrepreneurship in emerging markets. Their mentoring and advice will 100% better positions us for success.