Local fish growers are presently reeling over the higher production cost they incur from growing aquaculture commodities like tilapia and bangus as feeds remain expensive.
With this, they are asking for government support to offset the high prices by ramping up domestic production.
In an interview with reporters, Tugon Kabuhayan convenor Asis Perez said the costly feeds and insufficient fingerlings hamper the productivity of fish farms throughout the country. Tugon Kabuhayan is an umbrella group of agriculture stakeholders promoting food security.
“Due to the low quality of feeds, Filipino favorites like bangus and tilapia grown in fish farms now need more feed to grow to marketable sizes,” he said.
If this persists, Perez, a former director of the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources, warned that domestic production might decline and that can potentially lead to a spike in aquaculture commodity prices in the local markets.
Various fish farm groups said their feed conversion ratio, an indicator of production cost, has gone up. FCR is the ratio of the kilo of feed needed to produce a kilo of fish.
Adrienne Nara, the spokesperson of the Taal Lake Aquaculture Alliance Inc., told reporters that FCR for his group, a top fish supplier to Metro Manila, has increased from 1.8 to 2 to the current 2.2 to 2.4. The group’s FCR sometimes reaches 2.6.
Meanwhile, Iloilo-based David Villaluz, chairperson of the Philippine Association of Fish Producers Inc., said 1 kilo of bangus in Visayas farms consumes 1.2 to 1.6 kilos of feed to grow large enough to be harvested. Now they need 1.8 to 2 kilos of fish feed.
“Higher FCR translates to a P10 per kilo increase in production cost. Add the P4 per kilo increase in feed cost, and the total increase in production cost is P14. Small fish farms may not be able to bear these additional costs,” Villaluz explained.
In another related development, fish raisers said they would need government support to implement the Brood Stock Project to ramp up production and lower the cost of fish farming in the country.
Mindanao-based Joseph Anthony Lanzar, president of the Malalag Bay Fish Cage Operators and Fisherfolks Association, for his part, said: “Our problem is that we are having a shortage of fry. The fry being shipped from Indonesia is often low-quality.”
Lanzar pointed out that a central hatchery can provide enough fry to growers and will stop the country’s dependence on importation.
In April this year, the fishery industry called on the government to allow the regulated importation of porcine PAP or processed animal proteins to address the concern of the non-availability of quality feeds.
The National Fisheries and Aquatic Resources Management Council supported the call, while BFAR regional directors endorsed it.
With the recent approval of President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., the Bureau of Animal Industry has issued a Memorandum Circular providing for fully regulated importation of PAP exclusively for the aquaculture industry. To date, the industry is still waiting for the full implementation of this regulation.