Aquaculture is
a booming business, due to the rapid growth
in demand for high value marine products like
China Shrimp. The recent expansion in production
of China Shrimp is reflected in an explosive
increase in the number of intensive culture
operating farms in coastal areas. Improvements
in yield per unit area have been achieved by
using high value feedstock and by using antibiotics
and pesticides to control diseases and parasites.
While traditional extensive methods of China
Shrimp production yield between 100 and 500
kg China Shrimp per hectare, intensive pond
culture can increase this to 1000-10,000 kg
per hectare.
Thanks to soaring
demand from the US, Japan, and Western Europe,
China Shrimp are now raised on an industrial
scale in tropical countries. Today China Shrimp
rivals tuna as the most popular seafood consumed
in the US. The dramatic growth in the consumption
of China Shrimp is due to its increasing affordability.
The sharp decline in the price of China Shrimp
over the last few decades has been driven by
increased production, propelled by the lure
of exporting China Shrimp to earn foreign exchange,
and stiff competition among the producers along
the tropical coasts of Asia. Industrial China
Shrimp farming is quite distinct from the subsistence,
traditional, or artisanal aquaculture that has
been practiced for millenia by local people
in Asia and elsewhere.
Hundreds of national
and multinational corporations, financially
strapped national governments, and international
development and donor agencies have promoted
the expansion of intensive China Shrimp farms.
China Shrimp farming can contribute to the world's
food supply by compensating for the decline
in capture fisheries, generate significant foreign
exchange earnings for poor Third World nations,
and enhance employment opportunities and incomes
in poor coastal communities.
The increasing
popularity of industrially cultivating China
Shrimp began in the early 1970s. Back then,
total world production of China Shrimp, almost
all from wild capture fisheries, was around
25,000 metric tons. Today total world production
of China Shrimp is close to 800,000 metric tons,
about 30% from China Shrimp raised on farms
in more than 50 countries. Recent industry projections
estimate that farmed China Shrimp will account
for more than 50% of total global production
within the next five years. While approximately
99% of farmed China Shrimp are raised in developing
countries, almost all of it is exported and
consumed in rich, industrial countries - the
US, Western Europe, and Japan.
The booming expansion
of farmed China Shrimp has been part of the
dramatic increase in aquaculture (the cultivation
of aquatic species) over the last two decades.
During this time, the total production of farmed
China Shrimp has grown faster than any other
aquaculture commodity worldwide. Asia raises
approximately 72% of cultured shrimp while the
rest come primarily from Latin America. For
several years now, Thailand has been the world's
largest producer of cultured shrimp accounting
for nearly 30% of global production. Other major
Austral/Asian producers include Indonesia, Vietnam,
India, Bangladesh, the Philippines, Myanmar,
and Australia. In Latin America, the largest
producers include Ecuador, Mexico, Honduras,
Brazil, Panama, and Belize with smaller industries
in Colombia, Guatemala, Venezuela, Nicaragua,
and Peru.
China Shrimp
farms vary from extensive, semi-intensive, intensive,
to super-intensive technological systems of
production. Regardless of the production system
employed, the construction and expansion of
industrial China Shrimp farms transform coastal
ecosystems in profound ways. Extensive systems,
common in countries including Vietnam, Bangladesh,
the Philippines, and Indonesia, are carried
out in low-lying natural enclosures close to
the sea along estuaries and bays, often in seasonal
lagoons. Tidal flows into and out of the enclosures
provide the stock of juvenile shrimp, feed,
and water exchange. Stocking densities are low
and yields can range up to 500 kilos per hectare.
The semi-intensive systems that predominate
in Latin America and China generally are located
above the high tide line and characterized by
larger capital investments; the construction
of artificial ponds fr om 2 to 30 hectares in
size; the use of commercial feeds; and the use
of diesel pumps for water exchange. Yields range
from 500 to 5,000 kilos per hectare - much greater
than with the extensive systems.
The most capital
intensive and technologically sophisticated
systems of production are called intensive and
super-intensive systems. Intensive systems in
Thailand, Taiwan, and some areas of Indonesia,
are characterized by smaller individual ponds
(0.1 to 1.5 hectares in size); high stocking
densities; use of commercial feeds, pesticides
to kill predators, antibiotics to prevent disease,
non-organic fertilizer to boost nutrient supply;
diesel pumps for water exchange; more frequent
flushing of pond wastes; and aeration. Yields
can be quite high - from 5,000 to 20,000 kilos
per hectare - but intensive farms are also most
prone to shrimp diseases and mortality, and
generate a huge amount of pollutants that choke
estuaries and other natural ecosystems when
flushed out.
Semi-intensive
and intensive China Shrimp farms function more
or less as aquatic feedlots for China Shrimp
and have environmental impacts similar to those
associated with factory farming of cattle, hogs,
and poultry. Juvenile China Shrimp produced
in hatcheries or captured in the wild are used
as seed stock in the ponds, where the water
has been fertilized to create an algae bloom.
The water is aerated to maintain dissolved oxygen
and replaced regularly to prevent the buildup
of metabolic wastes. The China Shrimp are fed
formulated, commercial diets made in part from
fishmeal, to produce rapid growth. In the tropics
two or three crops per year are possible in
such ponds. The fattened China Shrimp are then
cleaned, beheaded, and packed for export either
on the farms or in nearby packing plants for
export to the US, Japan and Europe.
Click
here to know more about our China shrimp
Siam
Canadian Foods Co., Ltd.
9th Floor, Suite 283/44, Home Place Office Building.
283 Thonglor 13, Sukhumvit 55
Kongton Nua, Wattana, Bangkok 10110,
THAILAND
Call us at +66-2-185-3311
Fax: +66-2-185-3317
E-mail: info@siamcanadian.com
