Connect farm to desk: using data to bring iwi, scientists and marine farmers together

“The data gathered from the NEST float will be used to remotely monitor the health of the water, to inform decisions about our mussel farming operations,” explains Shorrock. “The launch was a great day. Karakia was observed throughout the process by our cultural Pou ‘Reo Mauri Ora’ Pohe Stephens, with support from one of our NMIT Aquaculture students Te Rito Hughes. The team were very respectful, including our mussel farmer. This project is a combination of our Matauranga Māori and scientific research.” 

Tokomaru Research Centre, Ocean Intelligence team and Clearwater Mussels team.

Ocean Intelligence is a partnership between the Tokomaru Research Centre – a new institute established by Te Rūnanga o Ngāti Rārua¹ – Clearwater Mussels who operate the farm for the iwi, the Cawthron Institute, and data science specialists, Oceanum. A spinout from the Precision Farming Technologies for Aquaculture Spearhead, the project is utilising a suite of proven sensors and bespoke software to create data-heavy digital dashboards for marine farmers. 

“The goal is to transition the aquaculture industry from one that’s largely based on experience, into something more data-driven and technology based,” says Cawthron’s Dr Chris Cornelisen. “For a mussel farmer working in a dynamic, super high-energy environment like the ocean, it’s not possible for them to just walk out to the paddock to check things. This project's been about bringing the farm to the desk; turning the lights on for the farmers, so they can manage their farms much more effectively and efficiently.” 

At Admiralty Bay, the mussels grow on lines that stretch from the surface down to 20 m. The Ocean Intelligence sensors continuously monitor the water temperature at different depths, to ensure conditions are suitable for mussel growth. Precise location data is also collected for each line by the NEST float, and lights and the batteries needed to power them are monitored too. Longer-term, additional sensors could be added, including those that measure ocean acidity and water turbidity (or clarity). The float housings are 3-D printed at Cawthron, which significantly reduces the cost of materials, making the platforms cheaper than those available from commercial suppliers. The data collected from all of the sensors in the NEST float is collated into a single online dashboard, providing farmers with data even when they are far from their mussel farm.

This is a valuable new tool for Ngāti Rārua, and Shorrock, who joined Tokomaru specifically to work on the Ocean Intelligence project, says the experience of deploying the float has been very positive, “I had a lot of learning to do from the start, but what’s helped is that everyone involved has been very open-armed and keen to be collaborating with us. We have monthly hui with them, and I visit the team at the Cawthron boatshed – their innovation hub – regularly. They’ve always responded to my requests, and helped us solve issues. It’s been fabulous.” 

Since its earliest inception, the goal of the Ocean Intelligence (OI) project was to turn great research into a commercial enterprise, for the benefit of New Zealand, as Cornelisen explains, “From day one, we’ve treated OI as a new company. It wasn’t about scientific papers. It was about building real solutions that can be commercialised and scaled.” The Spearhead project demonstrated to Cornelisen that it was the data itself – rather than the hardware used to collect it – that was particularly valuable. “The information we’re providing helps farmers to make decisions. Bringing in ocean data engineers from Oceanum was a step change for this. We now use a ‘data mesh’ that allows you to bring in lots of different data sets, whether it's forecasts or measurements, satellite imagery, whatever, and do your analytics on it in one place.”