In the scorching heat of the Saudi Arabian desert, more than 100 heavy Caterpillar machines are moving 20,000 cubic meters of sand every day to build the world’s largest fully-integrated aquaculture project.
The prawn farm run by Saudi Arabia’s National Prawn Company (NPC) produces no less than 50 tons of prawns daily.
It uses desert land unsuitable for agriculture or housing and water from the Red Sea.
It does not destroy mangroves, which are the traditional locations for prawn farms.
It relies on its own energy with a desalination installation and a 21MW power plant, as well as four mobile Cat generator sets.
The firm has opted to take all of its heavy equipment from one supplier, in this case, Caterpillar.
“The expert service and support from the local Cat dealer [Zahid] made it an obvious business decision to go 100 percent Cat,” says Rao Ganeswara, earthworks manager at NPC.
