The Kerala government has planned to mobilise an additional Rs 300 crore revenue through the commercial cage culture of various types of fish in open water, reservoirs and farms.
The government has framed a draft policy on water leasing for cage culture in various rivers and reservoirs, and the final policy will be announced soon. This will create an infrastructure framework for the commercial cage culture in Kerala. The Kerala fisheries department will soon chalk out plans to start cage culture in various reservoirs of the state.
Under the assistance of the Marine Products Export Development Authority (Mpeda), pilot projects are being carried out at Anapuazha and Pattanam in Ernakulam district, Thanneermukkam in Alappuzha district, Pozhiyoor in Thiruvananthapuram district and in Kannur. The pilot programme on cage culture of cobia is being carried out in Anappuzha. This will be ready for harvesting in six months. The finfish variety Cobia attains about 2.5 kg in weight in six months' period.
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Mpeda director M Shaji told Business Standardthat the second round harvesting of seabass (also a finfish) will be carried out at Anapuzha during next week. The fish here is fed with high quality feed imported from Vietnam. Mpeda will provide financial assistance to the programme. Shaji said the farmers had got good returns in this business as the average price ranged between Rs 300 and 400 per kg.
It is proposed to extend 40 per cent of the total cost as subsidy. The commerce ministry is likely to approve the scheme submitted by Mpeda within one month. This will set a new platform for fish production in Kerala, which is abundant with natural water resources.
This type of fish farming is hugely popular in countries like Vietnam, the Philippines, Thailand, China and Malaysia. During 2012, Vietnam had exported 23,000 tonne of Tilapia produced through cage culture. Vietnam has been successfully using this method to increase its fish production.
Shaji said Kerala can achieve an additional income of Rs 300 crore every year by marketing finfish like seabass, cobia and tilapia, which are cultured in specially-designed cages erected in open water sources and farms on commercial basis.
On an average, 800 kg of cobia (which has got good demand in local market) can be produced in one cage. The input material needed are fish seed, feed, cages and nets, all available in Kerala.
Around 15 persons can engage in culture activities on specially-made high density polyethylene (HDPE) cages. These cages can be used for 12-15 years for fish culture, he added. The cobia fingerlings stocked in the cages at Anapuzha are produced at the marine finfish hatchery of Rajiv Gandhi Centre for Aquaculture (RGCA) at Thiruvanthapuram.
RGCA works as a society under Mpeda, which was formed with the aim of aquaculture development and production of fingerlings of commercially important finfish varieties. A total of about 55 tonne of cobia fish, with an average size of 5 kg have been grown successfully at Pozhiyoor under the assistance of RGCA.
RGCA is involved in the commercial production of seabass fish fingerlings at Sirkali in Tamil Nadu; Tilapia fish fingerlings at Vijayawada in Andhra Pradesh; grouper fish fingerlings in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands and mangrove crab seeds at Mudcrab hatchery, Thoduvai in Tamil Nadu. It produces 200,000 fingerlings of cobia, 2 million seabass and 8 million fingerlings of Tilapia per annum.
