Ridley Aquafeed is set to launch a commercial prawn feed, Perform Plus NoCatch, containing no wild-caught fish.

The new formula is designed to avoid the price volatility to which other diets are subjected, relying as they do on wild caught fish meal, which has seasonal availability and variable catches.

The prawn version of the feed was launched last week and is the culmination of 10+ years of research by Dr Richard Smullen and his team.

A salmon version is in the final stages of commercial cage trials, and is reported to show the same performance as equivalent diets that include fishmeal.

“Using a broad range of high quality, responsibly sourced ingredients, we’ve learnt how to optimise our feeds to help deliver the biggest, healthiest and tastiest prawns and fish, and done it without relying on fishmeal. No one else in the world has been able to deliver this commercially,” said Dr Smullen.

The company recently held the inaugural Ridley Salmon Seminar, which attracted an international panel of speakers, including Huw Thomas, Fisheries and Aquaculture Manager for UK retailer Morrisons.

“We’re moving away from calling foods sustainable, but are focusing on whether production is responsible,” he said.

“Sustainability is typically thought of as the environmental footprint of food production only, but we need to really focus on the triple bottom line of environmental, social and economic responsibility.”