Overseas
Why did Nueva Pescanova withdraw its Las Palmas octopus farm project?
Nueva Pescanova said the administrative process had introduced new regulatory requirements that substantially changed the project’s conditions, scope and timeline. The proposed facility, designed to produce approximately 3,000 tonnes of octopus annually, will not be built in Gran Canaria. The withdrawal ends this specific project but does not necessarily bring the company’s octopus aquaculture research to an end.
Five generations bred in captivity. More than 52,000 square metres of port land requested. An industrial target of 3,000 tonnes a year. In the end, no tanks were built and no octopus was produced in Las Palmas.
On 23 July 2026, Nueva Pescanova submitted the withdrawal of its application for a public-domain concession to develop the “Granja de Cultivos Marinos” at the Port of Las Palmas. The administrative file, opened in May 2021, will now be closed. The project intended to become the world’s first large-scale commercial octopus farm will not enter production at the proposed location.
The scope of the decision must nevertheless be defined precisely. Nueva Pescanova is abandoning the design and location submitted to the Las Palmas authorisation process. The company has not announced the end of all research into octopus aquaculture and has left open the possibility of considering different technical, environmental or territorial solutions in the future.
Reproduction was achieved, but industrial viability was not
In 2019, Nueva Pescanova announced that it had closed the reproductive cycle of Octopus vulgaris in aquaculture, raising animals born in controlled conditions to adulthood and obtaining a new generation from them.
By November 2021, the company said it was already working with the fifth generation and identified summer 2022 as the target for the first commercial sales.
This was an important scientific result, although it was reported by the company itself and had yet to be translated into stable commercial production. Closing a species’ biological cycle is not the same as building a viable supply chain.
The Gran Canaria facility was intended to make precisely that transition. In July 2021, Spain’s Official State Gazette published the application to occupy 52,691.51 square metres of port land, together with 713 square metres of underground space and 517.68 square metres of submerged areas.
At full capacity, the farm was expected to produce approximately 3,000 tonnes annually. That figure represented an industrial target, not production already achieved.
Before reaching the market, the project still needed verifiable answers on growth, mortality, stocking density, feeding, biosecurity, water quality, effluent management and slaughter methods. Reproduction had overcome one biological obstacle. The sustainability and commercial reliability of the entire production system still had to be demonstrated at industrial scale.
The environmental process changed the project’s conditions
Nueva Pescanova attributed the withdrawal to business and regulatory considerations that emerged during the authorisation procedure.
According to the communication submitted to the Port Authority, observations from the competent bodies and new requirements introduced by the Canary Islands Environmental Assessment Commission had altered the project’s conditions, scope, schedule and regulatory obligations.
The proposed farm would have been subject to an ordinary environmental impact assessment after authorities identified potential effects requiring further investigation. Water management was also proceeding through a separate authorisation process. In April 2022, the Canary Islands’ official gazette opened a public consultation on the application to discharge water into the sea from the planned facility at La Esfinge dock.
The distinction is important. The project did not receive a definitive environmental rejection, because the assessment was never completed. However, it did not obtain the permits required to proceed either: Nueva Pescanova brought the process to an end by withdrawing its application.
Reputational risk emerged before the product
The Las Palmas facility never produced an octopus, but it had already triggered an international campaign.
Environmental and animal-welfare organisations opposed the intensive farming of a species known for complex behaviour. Their concerns included stocking density, the use of marine resources in feed, wastewater, animal welfare and the proposed slaughter method.
Campaign organisers said more than 42,000 messages had been sent to the president of the Port Authority calling for the administrative file to be closed. The Aquatic Life Institute, Compassion in World Farming and other organisations subsequently presented the withdrawal as a victory for their campaign.
For the seafood industry, this may be the most significant part of the case. A new production model must convince more than researchers, investors and regulators. It must also find buyers willing to purchase the product, distributors prepared to list it and consumers ready to accept it.
In the case of farmed octopus, controversy had already become part of the product’s potential commercial life. Quality, price and continuity of supply would not have been the only purchasing criteria. Seafood buyers and retailers would also have had to consider animal-welfare objections and the possible reputational consequences.
As Pesceinrete previously noted in its analysis of the limits of octopus aquaculture, this case should not be turned into a judgement on aquaculture as a whole. Different species and production systems cannot be treated as interchangeable. Farming bivalves or seaweed does not raise the same questions as creating an intensive supply chain for a cephalopod that has never reached consolidated commercial production.
NGO pressure mattered, but it was not the official reason
Public opposition was an important part of the story, but it cannot be presented as the established cause of the withdrawal. Nueva Pescanova formally linked its decision to the development of the administrative process and the additional regulatory requirements introduced during it.
It would therefore be inaccurate to claim that NGOs secured a formal environmental rejection of the facility. It is accurate to say that their campaign accompanied the entire authorisation process and turned the project into one of the most controversial cases in international aquaculture.
Las Palmas does not prove that breeding octopuses in captivity is biologically impossible. Nueva Pescanova maintains that its research demonstrated otherwise. What the case does show is that biological feasibility alone is not enough to create a new industry.
Any future project will need to present more than captive-bred octopuses. It will need robust evidence covering feed, mortality, stocking density, effluents, animal welfare, slaughter, regulatory approval and market acceptance.
Until then, the 3,000 tonnes planned for Las Palmas will remain what they always were: projected capacity, not seafood placed on the market.
