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Government secures Shs8b to revamp fisheries centre
Big catch. Fishermen collect fish from cages at Tende Bay in Garuga Village, Katabi Town Council in Wakiso District on June 11. Many fish farmers lack quality feeds to boost production. PHOTO BY EVE MUGANGA
What you need to know:
- Capacity. The aquaculture centre at Kajjansi currently has 23 fish ponds, 23 concrete tanks for production of fish feeds, a hatchery workshop and a feeds factory. Information from the ministry of Agriculture indicates that the country now produces less than two million fish fingerings out of the targeted 135 million to meet the growing demand for cage fish farming in the country.
Entebbe. Government has received Shs8.5 billion to revamp the Aquaculture Research and Development Centre in Kajjansi, Entebbe Municipality, through introducing modern technologies that will improve fish farming in the country.
Under the three-year project, the ministry of Agriculture intends to install an extruder that will improve the quality of fish feeds without compromising the environment.
An extruder is used in many countries to produce high-grade floating aquatic feed pellets for fish. The final products have unique shape and good taste, high nutrition and smooth texture.
Ms Joyce Ekwaput Nyeko, the acting commissioner for aquaculture in the Agriculture ministry, said the revamp will be funded under the third phase of the FAO-China South-South Cooperation.
“We want to make Kajjansi a centre of excellence for maintaining the brooder stock because right now, some of the hatcheries are collecting their brooding stock from the wild without first studying the genetic composition of the fish they are collecting, which sometimes compromises fish quality,” Ms Nyeko observed.
“We want Kajjansi to do applied research to come up with the right genetic composition of fish for the farmers,” she added.
The commissioner was speaking at a project formulation meeting attended by representatives from the governments of Uganda and China, and the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) in Entebbe on Monday.
Ms Nyeko decried the lack of quality fish feeds in Uganda, saying the latest technology will be able to solve the problem. “We have a problem of both quality and quantity. The quality imported is not good enough for the farmers who are now focusing on cage fish farming. Cage fishing requires high quality floating feeds, which are not compromised in terms of quality,” she added.
Ms Yu Haomiao, a representative from the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs in China, said Uganda is the first country to receive funding under the third phase of the China South-South Cooperation project.
The project, which kicks off in January, is also aimed at improving on the quality of livestock and rice growing, among others.
OUTLOOK OF SECTOR
Capacity. The aquaculture centre at Kajjansi currently has 23 fish ponds, 23 concrete tanks for production of fish feeds, a hatchery workshop and a feeds factory. Information from the ministry of Agriculture indicates that the country now produces less than two million fish fingerings out of the targeted 135 million to meet the growing demand for cage fish farming in the country.
Deficit. Uganda currently has a fish deficit of about 300,000 metric tonnes. The deficit can be overturned through a robust aquaculture programme, an official from the ministry of Agriculture said on Monday.
