Mulataga founder Dennis Gaunt grew up in Geraldton, a few hundred kilometres north of Perth, Western Australia. ‘From an early age I was inducted into the fishing industry,’ he says. As the years passed, Gaunt noticed the numbers of shellfish in the sea dropping and in the early 1980s decided to investigate the dwindling viability of aquaculture in the state. To an (at the time) unenthusiastic audience, Gaunt pitched his ideas about assisted regeneration in our oceans. With a balance between ecological responsibility and business sense (‘We’re green but we’re also pragmatic: we’ve got to live and eat’), Gaunt approaches fishing with what he calls an ‘environmental underlay’.
The company’s name was selected from an Aboriginal dictionary. ‘Moolataga’ roughly translates as ‘ancient or Dreamtime river fish’. The name was eventually adapted to ‘Mulataga’, with origins from the Noongyar tribe from the south-west of Western Australia.
When he first established the business, Gaunt decided to farm yabbies rather than saltwater crustacea, as the privately owned dams made easier work than government-controlled public waterways. The business was one of the first to tap into the yabby market – now a huge source of revenue for Australia. ‘That was the beginning of [Mulataga’s] drive into aquaculture,’ he says. The company now collaborates with the Fisheries Department on research and development projects, in particular learning more about the growth cycles of the crystal crab.
Today Mulataga operates fishing vessels from Broome and Lake Argyle to the Rainbow Coast (stretching across the south-west corner of Western Australia from Cape Leeuwin to Esperance) spanning a distance of more than 800 kilometres by road. The hostile West Australian coastline is home to many species that over the years have become Mulataga’s specialties.
Mulataga’s headquarters and packing factory are situated at the end of the runway at Perth International Airport. Live shellfish are purged in holding tanks (at the same temperature as the water they were found in) to cleanse them of dirt, excrement or sand, and are then packaged for live shipment to restaurants around the globe. In holding rooms live marron and yabbies are held at a chilled temperature to slow their heartbeat and minimise distress.