Our aim?
Improving the coastal environment and our community.
What is Câr-y-Môr?
Câr-y-Môr is a registered Community Benefit Society, a community of people built around two key aims:
To improve the coastal environment
To improve the well-being of the local community, through regenerative ocean farming and sustainable job creation.
Who is Câr-y-Môr?
We are proud to be the first community-owned regenerative ocean farm in Wales. Currently Câr-y-Môr has a diverse membership of over 300 members from truly all walks of life. It's this diversity in location, thought and experience that has been the biggest driver in our success to date.
Anyone can become a member of Câr-y-Môr as long as you support the aims of the society, you can decide on what level of involvement you would like.
To date we have directly created 14 fulfilling jobs, largely through our seafood processing and retail operation but increasingly on the farm as we scale up.
Câr-y-Môr has had two pilot farms in the seas off St Davids peninsula for the last two years. Here we have trialed growing different native seaweed and shellfish species, as well as learning the techniques required to operate an ocean farm. These trial sites have been run largely by Câr-y-Môr members kindly volunteering their time.
We have now successfully installed a bigger farm, to begin to operate at a commercial scale.
What is a Community Benefit Society?
A community benefit society is the ultimate community business. It is owned equally by all its members and membership is open to all that support its aims.
A community benefit society conducts business for the benefit of their community. Any generated profit is not distributed among members, or external shareholders, but reinvested back into the community benefit society to further achieve its aims (Ni business info, 2021).
The CBS structure creates a mechanism in which shares can be sold via a share offer, generating an ethical loan for the society.
What is Regenerative Ocean Farming?
Regenerative ocean farming is a form of aquaculture that sets out to produce food whilst also enhancing the marine environment and local communities. Key regenerative elements include:
Avoiding monocultures by farming many types of seaweeds and shellfish - mimicking nature and increasing resilience.
Producing nutrient food without the need of harmful or scarce inputs such as feed, fertilisers, chemicals or freshwater.
Creating fulfilling jobs for local people in deprived or highly seasonal coastal communities
Regenerative ocean farming seeks to maximise the positive environmental impact of the farm. Such as the creation of nursery habitat, providing coastal storm protection and improving water quality just to name a few.
What we refer to as regenerative ocean farming is also known by many other names such as: Integrated Multi Trophic Aquaculture (IMTA), polyculture or 3D ocean farming.
Our Future …
Our vision is to continue to develop our community business, ultimately striving towards our two core goals. We are set to develop a new refinery in St. Davids in the Spring of 2024, this will be a multi functional space, home to Seaweed processing facilities and a retail space.
We realise that the long list of potential benefits regenerative ocean farming can deliver are only truly achievable at scale.
As a community we are excited for the future, hopefully see you there.