Interview with Alison Baker

About Alison Baker

Alison Baker is co-founder and Managing Director of Eco Cascade. Alison has a business background in sustainable fashion and law, and before moving to the Highlands ran a campaign to reduce plastic pollution in rivers.

Eco Cascade

In 2022 Alison co-founded Eco Cascade, a Community Interest Company formed to support and grow the emerging seaweed cultivation industry in the west coast of Scotland. With the support of Marine Fund Scotland infrastructure funding, Eco Cascade opened its seaweed processing facility in April 2023 - in time for the Spring seaweed harvest - and provides washing, chopping and drying services for the industry.

Inspiration and Career

Alison's inspiration to get involved in the seaweed industry was an online presentation in 2021 by Paul Dobbins from WWF on the potential of seaweed farming, followed by meeting with Grace Yu who has been a driving force and inspiration in the formation and development of Eco Cascade. Alison founded Eco Cascade with Dr Cait Murray-Green in early 2022, and in late 2022 moved to the west coast of Scotland to set up the seaweed processing facility in Kyle of Lochalsh.

Inspirational Individuals and Organisations

Alison is particularly inspired by GreenWave in the US, set up as a charitable enterprise with a central mission to drive forward the growth of seaweed farming, without profit motivation. Eco Cascade has followed this focus by having a social and environmental impact mission.

Proudest Achievement

Alison's proudest aquaculture-related achievement to date is setting up Eco Cascade's processing site with no prior experience in production line processes, or seaweed handling. The learning curve was significant, but they have grown their capacity year on year with continuous improvement in their processes, and no industrial accidents.

Future Innovation

Alison thinks that seaweed farmers, and seaweed processors like Eco Cascade, will need to become keenly aware of the particular end market they are selling into. Rather than simply being specialists in seaweed, they will need to be known as specialists in these fields, for example, animal feed experts, or specialists in agricultural soil improvers.