Chileans are shifting from seaweed gatherers to cultivators

A recent article in Botanica Marina highlights a shift in the seaweed industry. The seaweed industry in Chile has predominately been a process of gathering off the coast, but that’s all changing now. The Chilean government provided subsidies to seaweed farming activities and investments in local valorization of the resources. The subsidies coupled with an increased number of technical studies related to seaweed resources has enabled the industry to pivot to seaweed cultivation.