Sparsholt College in Hampshire, well known for its fish related courses, has been awarded a £245,000 grant towards the rebuilding of its fish hatchery facility.
The money is being provided by the European Fisheries Fund and the Marine Management Organisation and will cover half the cost of replacing the college's existing 35-year-old outdoor facilities with new industry standard ones.
The college is already recognised as a centre of excellence for fisheries studies and it is hoped the new hatchery will enhance student experience as well as offer the college the potential to generate its own income as a research facility with possible clients including local fisheries re-stocking programmes and Environment Agency work.
The new facilities systems should also offer better reliability, improving levels of fish welfare as a result.
So far Sparsholt is the only UK college to be given a grant from the five year, £38m project which aims to make sure the UK's fishing industry becomes more sustainable while remaining profitable. The work should be completed by September 2012.
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