Global Seaweed New and Emerging Markets Report 2023

With its ability to sink carbon, sustain marine biodiversity, employ women, and unlock value chains, seaweed farming demonstrates how development, climate, and nature work together to generate value and uplift communities. Seaweed farming can help build a world free of poverty on a livable planet and has enormous growth potential.

The Global Seaweed New and Emerging Markets Report 2023 has identified ten global seaweed markets with the potential to grow by an additional USD 11.8 billion by 2030. Yet, much of the seaweed sector’s value remains untapped - it has clear growth potential beyond its current markets. Today, most farmed seaweed is used for direct human consumption, as fresh feed in aquaculture, or as hydrocolloids. However, seaweed-farmed products may be able to displace fossil fuels in sectors such as fabrics and plastics; can provide ecosystem services, such as carbon sequestration and nitrogen cycling; and can generate socioeconomic benefits in fragile coastal communities. Further, the market is currently dominated by a handful of Asian countries, which produce 98 percent of farmed seaweed by volume globally. Opportunities for growth in new regions and applications are high. 

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Key Messages 

• Seaweed farming can help support a world free of poverty on a livable planet. With its ability to sink carbon, sustain marine biodiversity, employ women, and unlock value chains, seaweed farming demonstrates how development, climate, and nature work together to generate value and uplift communities. 
• A new World Bank report examining ten emerging seaweed markets estimates their growth potential could be up to US$11.8 billion by 2030. Yet, despite this projection, much of the seaweed sector’s additional value remains untapped - it has clear growth potential beyond its current markets. 
• The report can be a good guide for entrepreneurs, investors, and policy makers worldwide on how to capitalize on the potential of the seaweed sector. It focuses on 10 emerging seaweed applications with the most promise for market diversification opportunities outside the dominant agar, alginate, carrageenan, food and aquaculture feed sectors. 
• The report also looks at the ecosystem service side of the seaweed sector - benefits such as biodiversity enhancement - providing case studies from emerging projects, along with projections relating to whether and how these services could one day be monetized.
• At a time when global resources are increasingly overstretched, the world must capitalize on resources – such as seaweed – that can both be swiftly regenerated and potentially help to regenerate the ecosystems that support them. Enhanced seaweed production and improved value chains can have both economic and environmental benefits. For example, seaweed-farmed products may eventually be able to displace fossil fuels in sectors such as fabrics and plastics.