The cultivation of seaweeds for high value products : prospects and challenges

The domestication of seaweed cultivars (in the 1940s) ended the reliance on natural cycles and raw material availability for some species, driven by consumer demands that far exceeded the available supplies. Currently, global seaweed cultivation is unrivaled in mariculture with 96% of annual seaweed biomass derived from cultivated sources. In the last decades, research has confirmed seaweeds as rich sources of potentially valuable compounds. Most existing seaweed cultivars and current cultivation techniques may not necessarily be optimized to produce valuable bioactive compounds. The future of the seaweed industry will include the development of high-value markets for functional foods, cosmeceuticals, nutraceuticals, and pharmaceuticals.