Lessons on fish farming from Uganda
Fish farmers in Isingiro District with their harvest. Uganda, being a leading producer of farmed fish in Africa, there are several lessons and best practices to share with other countries. FILE PHOTO
What you need to know:
Uganda is a leading producer of farmed fish in Africa. This is has not escaped the notice of other countries for the lessons to learn
As Africa grapples with increasing population in relation to pressure on food sources like lakes and rivers for fish, a number of countries have taken to alternatives including fish farming to guarantee food security.
A team of prospective fish farmers from Malawi visited Uganda to learn lessons from aquaculture that they can apply in their country.
Mike Moyo, an official from Malawi’s ministry of urban development, says they are piloting a project on fish farming.
Greater benefits
“It is on how aquaculture, and in particular fish farmer associations can improve livelihoods. Uganda is one of the best countries in fish production in Africa and, despite being a landlocked country it has done fish farming longer than Malawi,” Moyo said during a meeting with Walimi Fish Farmers’ Cooperative Society (Waficos) in Kampala recently.
He observed that the Ugandan system of fish farmer associations and cooperatives is strong and brings greater benefits.
Learning visits
“We want to see if it can work in Malawi. This system has worked for Uganda. We have read about the innovations like fish sausages among others. We want the Malawian fish farmers to learn the best practices on cooperatives, business planning, lobbying government, value addition, marketing, working with extension workers, peri-urban fish farming, among others,” Moyo added.
Lovin Kobusingye, manager Kati fish farm and Waficos member, noted that the team from Malawi is the third to visit Uganda this year about issues concerning fish farming.
“We hosted Kenya early this year and DR Congo followed. I believe Uganda is destined to impact these countries despite the challenges. They have been to the aquaculture research and development centre in Kajjansi, had an engagement with the fisheries minister and a number of field visits,” Kobusingye said.
Similar but different
Like Uganda, Malawi is a landlocked country. One third of it is covered by Lake Malawi, which is the habitat of a wide range of fish species according to information from the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation. Fisheries contribute about 70 per cent to the protein intake of Malawi’s 13.6 million people.
Moyo pointed out that most of the people are too poor to afford meat and rely on fish. But the supply of fish from Lake Malawi and other water bodies has been declining from about 30,000 tonnes a year in the late twentieth century to the current 2,000 tonnes a year.
“Over-fishing is one of the reasons, and population growth compounds the problem,” he said.
An official on the 14-person visiting team, Patrick Mweninguwe, noted: “Fish farming has become indispensable but we cannot compare Malawi to Uganda because our aquaculture sector is still developing and the fish export market is also low. We export little to Zimbabwe and Zambia.”
Challenges
He added, “This engagement was very enlightening and we have learnt practices and concepts like the beach management units. We have learnt how cooperatives are established and how they share dividends, training elements, and marketing aspects.”
To improve food security, African governments are in favour of fish farming though it continues to face challenges of its own, of course.
One is the high cost of feeds, which producers ultimately pass on to consumers. A more serious problem being the drying up of rivers and streams as a result of both climate change and forest degradation. Without water, fish farms are clearly unrealistic.
3
TEAMS THAT HAVE VISITED UGANDA THIS YEAR
14
Number of PERSONS IN THE TEAM FROM MALAWI
