Yumbah Aquaculture beds down second acquisition in months with Tassie oyster operation

Yumbah Aquaculture is well on the way to a dominant position in Australian aquaculture with the acquisition of a Tasmanian oyster outfit.

Ben Cameron of Cameron of Tasmania mixing micro-algaes to generate energy to grow oysters. Picture: Supplied.

Yumbah Aquaculture has bought family-owned oyster producer Cameron of Tasmania in a multimillion-dollar deal designed to help it become a dominant force in the Australian seafood sector.

The aquaculture company, backed by rich-lister Anthony Hall who made his fortune through Pro Medicus, the medical imaging company he founded in 1983, has paid an unspecified but “significant’’ amount for the business just months after buying Port Phillip Bay mussel producer Bay Sea Farms.

Prior to the two acquisitions Yumbah produced farmed abalone and oysters at facilities at Narrawong in Victoria, Port Lincoln and Kangaroo Island in South Australia, and Bicheno in Tasmania, as well as operating a central processing facility and a feed production operation, both in SA.

Yumbah Aquaculture director and major shareholder Anthony Hall. Picture: Supplied

Cameron’s site at Dunalley, and its SA hatchery operations which were a joint venture with Yumbah, will now join the fold.

Yumbah chief executive David Wood said the acquisition of Cameron would boost Yumbah’s shellfish production by 20 per cent.

“This is certainly a milestone transaction for Yumbah in its corporate profiling,’’ Mr Wood said.

“The company has a strong history in abalone farming and is Australia’s largest abalone farmer.

“Our strategy is to broaden the business into being Australia’s leading shellfish aquaculture company and in recent years we’ve taken steps to doing that.’’

The hatchery joint venture at Port Lincoln was the first step, with the acquisition following the two businesses working closely together in recent years.

“Going a further step and bringing in the Tasmanian operations brings us further scale in the oyster space, both in terms of taking control of the Port Lincoln hatchery but also Cameron’s operations in Tasmania include a hatchery where they produce spat (juvenile oysters) not only for their own grow-out but also for the Tasmanian industry.’’

Ben Cameron holding oyster spat. Picture: Supplied.

Mr Wood said the Cameron acquisition and the recent purchase of Bay Sea Farms highlighted the company’s drive to build a diversified portfolio in the aquaculture space.

“That gives us breadth of species and geography to build a sustainable business with a growth outlook,’’ Mr Wood said.

After completion of the Cameron transaction, Yumbah would be producing about 700 tonnes of abalone per year, 350-400 tonnes of mussels and more than 150 million oyster spat and 2.6 million mature oysters.

Mr Wood said all of the businesses were vertically-integrated, with feed and spat at the start of the processes through to branded product sales.

“Yumbah has established a good footprint globally with abalone,’’ Mr Wood said.

“We think there is opportunity to go in with a multidimensional offer, taking oysters and mussels and talking to our customers about a range of products and hence build the brand.’’

Cameron of Tasmania was set up in 1971 and claims to have set up the first commercial oyster hatchery in the Southern Hemisphere by the late 1970s.

The company supplies oyster spat to growers in Tasmania and SA and is the sole supplier of its in-house “Golden Oyster’’.

Originally published as Yumbah Aquaculture beds down second acquisition in months with Tassie oyster operation