This article was featured in Eurofish Magazine 3 2026.
Norwegian restoration company Restorae AS and Japanese feed manufacturer Nosan Corporation have announced a partnership to address one of the key challenges facing native European oyster restoration—the reliable production of juvenile oysters at scale. The native European oyster, which once formed extensive reef systems from the North Sea to the Mediterranean, is now considered functionally extinct across most of its historic range following centuries of overharvesting, disease, and competition from invasive Pacific oysters. Restoration efforts across Europe have gained momentum in recent years, but hatchery survival rates and feed supply for early stage spat remain significant constraints.
The partnership centres on Nosan’s SpatCare feed, a shelf stable juvenile bivalve supplement with a 15-micron particle size and nutrient density equivalent to approximately 30 billion diatoms per gram. Already in use in Japanese aquaculture for two decades, the product is designed to support growth in bivalve spat from as small as 2 mm. Restorae will work to make the technology available to restoration partners across Europe. Over the coming three months, the partnership will seek to validate the feed’s effectiveness with native European oysters through trials with commercial, scientific, governmental and NGO partners, ahead of a broader rollout to restoration initiatives across the continent.
