Ag-focused investment fund has $150 million to deploy in aquaculture

"The reasons are not going to come as a surprise," Jones said. "As the middle-class is getting wealthier, they want to replace alternative protein with fish, and as people are getting more worried about the environment where fish is growing, the prospects for recirculating aquaculture systems (RAS) is growing."

ADM Capital manages the $322 million (€288 million) Cibus Fund, which closed in October 2018, and is built to invest in rapidly growing food chain companies.

The company has already deployed 55 percent of the capital by investing in nine agriculture-related businesses, and is now focused on pouring the other $150 million (€134 million) into aquaculture.

However, past experiences mean the company's search is not global.

"A lesson we learned is that the rule of law is important, and so we are not focusing on Africa, Latin America and parts of Asia," Jones said. "We believe we can protect investment more that way."

Instead, the search is limited to Europe, North America, New Zealand and Australia.

The company has already considered an unnamed shrimp business in Australia and is attending various salmon conferences in Norway to get updates on RAS systems.

But ADM Capital remains wary of the risks, including the viability of RAS systems. "It is not a new concept and yet there is very few operators doing it successfully in scale," Jones noted.