First For Australia: BAP-Certified Rainbow Trout Farms
Congratulations to Goulburn River Trout, the first rainbow trout business in Australia and the Eastern Hemisphere to attain Best Aquaculture Practices (BAP) certification.
Both of the company’s farms, Thornton Farm and Walnut Island Farm, which are located in the foothills of the Great Dividing Range in northeast Victoria, earned BAP certification on Oct. 25.
The rainbow trout are grown out in raceways using water from the Goulburn River, which flows from Lake Eildon, providing a year-round supply of cold, clear water.
Family-owned Goulburn River Trout is responsible for its own trout breeding, grow-out, processing and distribution. The company produced just over 1,000 metric tons of trout in the last fiscal year. Its products, including fresh, frozen and smoked whole trout and fillets, are distributed domestically and exported to Asia.
The Goulburn River Trout farm was established in the mid-1970s by the Leake family. In 1990 Hugh Meggitt bought the family’s farm and an expansion program was commenced. Today, the company’s operations are headed up by Derrick Meggitt and Ed Meggitt, who both have more than 25 years of industry experience.
“Goulburn River Trout is really pleased to be the first trout-farming business in our neck of the woods to gain BAP certification. We are a long-running family operation, and sustainability and intergenerational farming is central to the way we operate,” said Ed Meggitt.
Currently, there are 15 BAP-certified rainbow trout farms worldwide — eight in the United States, four in Colombia, one in Peru and now two in Australia.
About BAP
A division of the Global Aquaculture Alliance, Best Aquaculture Practices is an international certification program based on achievable, science-based and continuously improved global performance standards for the entire aquaculture supply chain — farms, hatcheries, processing plants and feed mills — that assure healthful foods produced through environmentally and socially responsible means.
