MacAlister Elliott and Partners (MEP) have recently advised Saudi Agricultural and Livestock Investment Company (SALIC) on its acquisition of 42.4% in the National Aquaculture Group CJSC (Naqua), a company incorporated in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) specializing in aquaculture operations.
MEP provided aquaculture technical due diligence services, evaluating SALIC’s technical capacity to produce their declared production capacity.
The MEP team providing the aquaculture technical due diligence was led by Daniel Auwkit and Patrick White who undertook a 10-day field trip to Naqua, where they observed all of the shrimp and fish production facilities. They worked alongside other companies who provided due diligence for legal, financial, organisational, commercial, and biological services.
Saudia Arabia-headquartered NAQUA operates 80 nurseries, 77 super-intensive ponds, and 547 open inland ponds spread over 4,485 hectares, with an annual production capacity of 90,000 metric tons (MT) of shrimp, according to its website. It also operates an aquafeed mill and 20 net-pens farming 15,000 MT of barramundi annually, and a sea cucumber broodstock unit, hatchery, grow-out facilities, and processing plant. NAQUA is a leader in the aquaculture sector. It is one of the largest producers of Vannamei shrimp and Seabass globally, with a production capacity reaching more than 60,000 tons annually, exporting to more than 30 countries worldwide.
The Minister of Environment, Water and Agriculture (MEWA) and Chairman of the board of directors of SALIC, Abdulrahman AlFadley, said that the strategic partnership with NAQUA comes within the framework to achieve the objectives of the Kingdom’s Vision 2030 in the field of ensuring the sustainability of vital resources. The Vision 2030 plan calls for Saudi Arabia to achieve 600,000 metric tons of aquaculture production by 2030.
This is in addition to achieving SALIC’s strategic goals of attaining national objectives for food security and empowering the agri-food sector by enhancing local production, which will be reflected in narrowing the trade balance deficit.
