Fish Farming In The Desert?

(Hat Tip: Israpundit)

Although I've heard of fish farms in the US, I am quite surprised that these Israeli's were able to create one in the middle of the desert. Not to mention convince everyone to invest in this project.

(New York Times) Fish farming in the desert may at first sound like an anomaly, but in Israel over the last decade a scientific hunch has turned into a bustling business.

Scientists here say they realized they were on to something when they found that brackish water drilled from underground desert aquifers hundreds of feet deep could be used to raise warm-water fish. The geothermal water, less than one-tenth as saline as sea water, free of pollutants and a toasty 98 degrees on average, proved an ideal match. [...]

"It is important to stop with the reputation that arid land is nonfertile, useless land," said Professor Appelbaum, who pioneered the concept of desert aquaculture in Israel in the late 1980s. "We should consider arid land where subsurface water exists as land that has great opportunities, especially in food production because of the low level of competition on the land itself and because it gives opportunities to its inhabitants."

What makes this story even more remarkable is the fact that scientists have found a way to reuse the water the fished were raised in (full of yucky fish waste) and irrigate farmers crops.

This not only watered the plants, but also provided an excellent source of cheap fertilizer. Hopefully they can export these techniques to third world nations, as I'm sure they would definitely appreciate it.

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