Cultivation of Porphyra began in the 17th century, in Japan, Korea and China, and has since become one of the most important industries using shallow water areas in all of these countries. Originally, laver farming had to depend on natural seed conchospores due to poor knowledge about its life cycle and where its seeds came from. However, in 1949, Kathleen Drew Baker discovered that the alga Conchocelis rosea was actually a stage in the life history of Porphyra. This was a great discovery for the farming industry, which solved the bottleneck that prevented the artificial production of seeds. Since then, Chinese and Japanese experts have developed the techniques of breeding conchocelis and collecting conchospores. Now, no laver farm collects seeds from the wild any more. Laver farming has become a prosperous sector of aquaculture in China, RO Korea, and Japan. Besides these traditional producers, laver farming activities are gradually expanding to other continents, including Africa, North America and Europe.

Website: http://www.fao.org/fishery/culturedspecies/Porphyra_spp/en