52 June 2010 industry in northern climates and provides a dedicated facility to conduct workshops with new information on aquaculture in northern climates. Research and Extension staff at the NADF work with the commercial sector, the scientific community and regulatory agencies to provide two-way communication addressing the constraints of commercial- and public-sector aquaculture in the region. For further information on the Northern Aquaculture Demonstration program, please visit the following websites: http://aquaculture.uwsp.edu http://www.fws.gov/midwest/ashland/mtan/mtanhome.html Open-Ocean Aquaculture Demonstration Program In 2005, the Bush administration introduced the National Offshore Aquaculture Act. Although there are still many technical and legal obstacles to iron out, the primary goal of this legislation is to “Encourage the development of responsible marine aquaculture in the Exclusive Economic Zone by providing the necessary authorities and procedures for offshore marine aquaculture operations, demonstrations, and research through publicprivate partnerships.” Prior to the submission of the bill, research and demonstration of new technologies developed to produce aquaculture products in the deepwater marine environment have been underway for many years. Projects are currently in the water and are basically demonstration projects as defined in the Act, “demonstration’” means pilot-scale testing of aquaculture science and technologies, or farm-scale research. The University of New Hampshire’s (UNH) Atlantic Marine Aquaculture Center initiated its Open Ocean Aquaculture Demonstration Project with funding from NOAA (the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) in 1998 and in 1999, stocked its first fish, summer flounder (Paralichthys dentatus), into a submersible cage off the coast of New Hampshire. This project, designed to conduct research and demonstrate the feasibility of the concept by a team of University of New Hampshire marine biologists, engineers and extension staff and, in collaboration with local fishermen, develop and transfer new technological innovations to the commercial sector. Since the project’s inception, several species of marine finfish have been successfully stocked into the cages including summer flounder, cod, haddock and halibut. The UNH project also developed equipment and techniques to grow blue mussels in the open-ocean environment. That technology has been transferred to a commercial fisherman who has 12 longlines capable of producing 68,000 Kg of blue mussels a year in 40 feet of water off the New Hampshire coast. The UNH helped the fisherman get the necessary permits and continues to work with him on improving harvesting and processing techniques. Other fishermen and interested parties have visited the site as part of the technology transfer process. For additional information on this ongoing project, please visit the following websites: http://ooa.unh.edu http://extension.unh.edu/News/ Mussels.htm Conclusion In conclusion, the demonstration project is not dead. Rather, it still remains a valuable tool in the extension agent’s toolbox alongside the new information technologies currently available in the 21st century...so the legacy of Seaman Knapp lives on. The projects outlined above are but a few of many that exist across the US. Extension activities consisting of demonstration projects, workshops, research highlights, fact sheets, production manuals and more importantly, personal, face-to-face home and farm visits, continue in the traditional sense in Cooperative Extension offices located throughout the US. It lives on in coastal communities that are the focus of the national and state Sea Grant programs that provide information and resources for new opportunities beyond the traditional fish- (Continued onpage 67)
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