The Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries, Water and Land Reform (MAFWLR), Inge Zaamwani, visited the site earmarked for the Africa Aquaculture Company offshore salmon farming project in Lüderitz to see the progress and plans for the upcoming operations.

Zaamwani told the NBC News team that the project is progressing well and that the project has a lot of economic potential. 

The salmon farming project by the African Aquaculture Company aims to establish an offshore farm near Lüderitz. 

The project aims to import salmon fish eggs, hatching them in a hatchery and later transferring the fish to fish net cages where they will grow in the ocean. 

"It's a project we licensed already last year in June-July there, and I just wanted to see the progress they have made since then, and yes, there has been visible progress according to the briefing we got from the country director, and six months from now they should be able to produce the eggs here in Namibia. Currently they told us because of the lack of facilities, they are doing that from their facilities in South Africa in Paarl round about September, and so they will be bringing those to transport to start their actual project, the process of farming the salmon, the smolt which will eventually grow into salmon."

Zaamwani further stated the project aligns with the country's national objectives and that the government wants to promote these sorts of initiatives to ensure a sustainable fish supply. 

"We all know the national fish in the ocean volumes are decreasing; our time and valuable cash are becoming less and less, so we must make plans to diversify what's in mariculture and aquaculture. Some of the initiatives we want to promote are to make sure we replace that which is getting depleted from our own oceans, and therefore, when I visited and saw the social impact in Lüderitz, it's indeed in full production scale, about 51 metric tonnes, about two; it's going to be a big project with a spin-off of employment opportunities for the town of Lüderitz." 

The country director for Africa Aquaculture Company, Clement Kaukuetu, informed the minister the first batch of salmon eggs has already been imported from South Africa, Paarl. 

"We will bring in 50 000 eggs for hatching, and about 12 months after that we must set out this smolt to sea, which means, in fact, in a space of 6 months from then we will start with construction of net bands and set out to sea here in Lüderitz."