Photos’ credit: Dian Tugu Warsito Taufik (Indonesia)
Review: Dian Tugu Warsito Taufik and Abdel Rahman El Gamal (Founder of the website)
Eucheuma cottonii is red seaweed that has a high economic value because of its contents of agar and carrageenan. Agar is widely used in food industry as a food additive, rehydrating food, a thickening agent, and viscosity controller while carrageenan is used as a stabilizer, thickener, suspending agent, and a gelling agent in food. Carrageenan is also used in non-food products such as toothpaste, cosmetics, paints, and textile dyes.
The inserted photos show the culture of seaweed (Eucheuma cottonii) in Alor Island using off-bottom method. The tools used in this method are stakes and line in which cuttings of seaweed are tied at to lines at 25 cm intervals. Additional rows are added about 1 m apart. The weight of the plant upon culture is about 50 g reaching a harvest weight of about 350 g after 40 days of culture to allow the crop to mature and increase its carrageenan content. Harvesting is done through the uprooting of the plants. After harvesting the seaweed is dried before being sold, baled and sent for carrageenan extraction.
It may worth mentioning that Indonesia produces more than 20% of global production of Eucheuma Seaweed.
