{"id":895988,"date":"2026-09-18T01:48:17","date_gmt":"2026-09-18T01:48:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/895988\/"},"modified":"2026-09-18T01:48:17","modified_gmt":"2026-09-18T01:48:17","slug":"augustas-pioneering-abalone-ranch-winding-down-amid-mounting-losses","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/895988\/","title":{"rendered":"Augusta’s pioneering abalone ranch winding down amid mounting losses"},"content":{"rendered":"

The world’s first ocean-ranched abalone operation is winding down on Western Australia’s southern coast as export prices fall and losses rise.<\/p>\n

In 2019, the business was riding high on an export “gold rush” to Chinese consumers<\/a>, making it the biggest employer in Augusta.<\/p>\n

Locals were employed to dive and harvest abalone off artificial reefs in Flinders Bay, as well as process the molluscs at a nearby facility.<\/p>\n

Now, Rare Foods Australia (RFA) is winding down the business, having accumulated losses of more than $25 million as of June last year, according to financial documents.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

The molluscs are considered a delicacy in a number of Asian countries. (ABC News: Nicholas Martyr)<\/p>\n

The company’s financial hardship comes amid a slump in the global abalone market, driven by drastically expanded supply from China’s farmed abalone industry.<\/p>\n

The company’s 2024\u201325 financial report, lodged with the corporate regulator earlier this month, shows RFA sustained a yearly loss of $4,833,469, and that its net assets had halved from $9.6 million to $4.7 million.<\/p>\n

A wind-down strategy adopted in 2025 included workforce restructuring and reductions in operating expenditure.<\/p>\n

By June, it had delisted from the Australian Securities Exchange to “reduce the significant costs associated with ASX listing”.<\/p>\n

The company also stopped seeding juvenile abalone into its artificial reefs in Augusta.<\/p>\n

RFA declined ABC’s request for comment.<\/p>\n

Family founder leaves industry<\/p>\n

After founding the company, then known as Ocean Grown Abalone in 2011, long-time managing director Brad Adams left RFA and the wider seafood industry earlier this year.<\/p>\n

Having followed his father’s footsteps into the industry, he said stiff competition from Chinese producers had effectively halved export prices for greenlip abalone.<\/p>\n

\"Windswept<\/p>\n

Brad Adams says adapting to changed conditions is essential, but not always possible. (ABC South West WA: Jon Daly)<\/p>\n

“We were probably averaging around $55 to $60 a kilogram. Ranched abalone is now around $30, $35,” Mr Adams said.<\/p>\n

“Any business that loses half its margin that quickly has to respond and adapt pretty quickly.<\/p>\n

“Sometimes you can’t adapt, and you just have to look for other opportunities, and that’s not the end of the world either.”<\/p>\n

Aquaculture output ‘halved’<\/p>\n

A drastic expansion over two decades has seen the Chinese industry reach production of around 200,000 tonnes per year.<\/p>\n

The result has been a flooded Chinese market, once the biggest consumer of Australian abalone.<\/p>\n

Mr Adams said other big players were also exiting Australia’s aquaculture industry.<\/p>\n

“It’s probably halved production in the last two years,” he said.<\/p>\n

Last year, two Tasmanian farms closed<\/a>, including an operation at Bicheno owned by Yumbah Aquaculture, Australia’s largest producer.<\/p>\n

\"An<\/p>\n

Yumbah Aquaculture’s Kangaroo Island facility, which has operated for more than 30 years. (Supplied: Yumbah Aquaculture)<\/p>\n

The devastating algal bloom along South Australia’s coast also saw Yumbah close its farm<\/a> on Kangaroo Island.<\/p>\n

The challenging conditions have also halted plans for the industry to establish another foothold along WA’s southern coast near Esperance.<\/p>\n

A proposal for an abalone ranch and broader aquaculture precinct began in 2017<\/a>, backed by the Esperance Tjaltjraak Native Title Aboriginal Corporation [ETNTAC], in collaboration with Rare Foods Australia and Yumbah.<\/p>\n

But the project has sat on the shelf since.<\/p>\n

ETNTAC chief executive Peter Bednall said it made sense to investigate the project’s future potential, but the recent downturn meant further expansion was in question.<\/p>\n

\"Middle<\/p>\n

Peter Bednall says more needs to be done to build community resilience in small towns reliant on international industry. (ABC News: Emily Smith)<\/p>\n

“The reality is the concept we explored needs an awful lot of capital,” he said.<\/p>\n

“We think that’s really important for towns like this, that our young people have the opportunities to stay here and develop their expertise in a range of different areas.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The world’s first ocean-ranched abalone operation is winding down on Western Australia’s southern coast as export prices fall…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":895989,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[325721,465256,465255,64,465260,465258,465259,63,465253,465251,465250,99,465257,465254,465249,249835,41844,45,465252],"class_list":["post-895988","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-abalone","tag-abalone-exports","tag-abalone-prices","tag-au","tag-augusta-abalone","tag-augusta-jobs","tag-augusta-seafood","tag-australia","tag-australian-abalone","tag-australian-aquaculture","tag-brad-adams","tag-business","tag-chinese-abalone","tag-green-lipped-abalone","tag-rare-foods-australia","tag-rural-news","tag-south-west-news","tag-wa-news","tag-yumbah-aquacultural"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/895988","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=895988"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/895988\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/895989"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=895988"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=895988"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=895988"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}