Cawthron Laboratories have provided trusted laboratory testing services to Aotearoa New Zealand’s food and natural products sector for over 40 years, helping our customers meet food safety and export requirements. Our fully accredited and certified labs and specialist research development teams, based at facilities in Whakatū Nelson and Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland, meet each customer’s unique needs. We provide tailored testing services with flexible, wrap-around administrative and technical support. The whole team, from our customer service staff to laboratory technicians, are committed to understanding your business.

Located 15 minutes from Nelson’s CBD, Cawthron Aquaculture Park is a world-class research and technology centre for the New Zealand aquaculture sector and its stakeholders. It’s a shared facility, purpose-built for aquaculture research, education and commercial development.

Fully-serviced land units are available to lease, which are well suited to aquaculture activities. The site holds all the necessary permits for aquaculture activities, the pond and buildings, and the seawater take and discharge.

On-site facilities are equipped with:

• purpose designed wet-laboratories

• intensive algae culture facilities

• dry-laboratories

• a nursery building serviced by managed algae ponds, offices and amenities.

Covering 20 hectares, the park already hosts aquaculture industry firms, teaching labs operated by the Nelson Marlborough Institute of Technology, and Cawthron’s own aquaculture and biotechnology research group.

Contact the Cawthron Aquaculture Park 

Phone +64 3 545 0127

Email: info@cawthron.org.nz

The Cawthron Institute Culture Collection of Microalgae (CICCM) is a nationally significant living collection which underpins research worldwide, and supports vital work to ensure the safety of New Zealand seafood. The only one of its kind in New Zealand, the collection is highly ranked in the Asia-Pacific region, and is a member of the Asia Oceania Algae Collection network.

The collection currently contains:

• 14 classes of marine and freshwater microalgae including several species that are unique to New Zealand or have properties not found in overseas containments. 

• more than 300 cryopreserved strains of toxic microalgae and cyanobacteria

• a living collection of 300 isolates.

For more information and to order from the collection click here. 

The Cawthron Algal Centre is a specialist research and pilot production facility run by Cawthron’s Algae and Bioactives team. Our scientists work with industry and research partners to discover useful natural compounds and explore how they could create value for New Zealand’s ocean economy.

We support every stage of bioactive development, from identifying and analysing promising compounds through to small-scale production and further refinement. We also provide specialist services and products for commercial and academic customers.

One of our key areas of expertise is producing highly purified toxin reference materials and analytical standards. These are used by laboratories and researchers to accurately detect and study toxins. Most are microalgal toxins associated with paralytic shellfish poisoning, but we also produce compounds from bacterial and land-based sources. Cawthron supplies these specialised materials to customers around the world.

Cawthron Aquaculture Park is home to New Zealand’s only dedicated Finfish Research Centre, opened in 2018 with funding support from the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE). The Finfish Research Centre delivers commercially relevant science to enable improved stock management, breeding, and husbandry and supports the development and growth of New Zealand’s aquaculture industry.

The Centre directly supports Cawthron Institute’s delivery of publicly-funded research programmes, including the MBIE-funded Climate Adapted Finfish Research Programme, combining new, innovative analytical tools with industry-wide data analysis, environmental monitoring, and controlled trials.

The knowledge generated through this research has supported improved selective breeding of finfish, boosting production efficiency, leading to greater economic returns and sustainable environmental management.

Cawthron’s National Algae Research Centre (NARC) was completed in May 2021. Based at Cawthron Aquaculture Park in Glenduan, the Centre is a hub of innovation and knowledge that supports the establishment of New Zealand’s burgeoning seaweed industry.

Key areas of research focus at the National Algae Research Centre include: 

• Extraction of bioactive compounds 

• Climate change mitigation solutions

• Seaweed ecology

• Alternative proteins and sustainable food production

• Farming systems development (including current Asparagopsis armata research)

Cawthron also delivers specialist work in extracting high-value bioactive compounds from microalgae.

Te Wero Aro-anamata is Cawthron’s state-of-the-art aquatic biocontainment facility. The facility, which opened in 2022, is equipped to undertake pathogen-related research targeting known aquatic bacteria, viruses and parasites in New Zealand. Research of this nature protects New Zealand’s environment and our seafood industry from biosecurity threats including pests and disease.

This facility enables safe and secure research into new aquaculture species which could be commercialised in New Zealand in the future and will require health R&D alongside productivity-focused commercial research.

The facility is equipped to conduct R&D in the following areas:

• Pest/Pathogen identification

• Pest threshold and prediction

• Transmission studies

• Species susceptibility trials

• Treatment strategies

• Potency studies

• Salmon vaccine development

• Breeding for disease resistance

• Future proofing