Khanh Hoa Fisheries Sector: Striving for more Sustainable Development

Khanh Hoa Fisheries Sector: Striving for more Sustainable Development

Khanh Hoa is famous not only for its beautiful tourist sites but also for the most developed fisheries in Vietnam. Over the past few years, the local fisheries sector has seen a great development in fry production, aquaculture, fishing and seafood processing. The sector has made a great contribution to effectively exploiting the province’s potential and earning higher export turnover.

Increasing aquaculture effectiveness

Khanh Hoa developed aquaculture very early. Its area for aquaculture development has expanded over the time. In 2003, the province built large industrial shrimp farming areas in Cam Thinh Dong, Cam Ranh commune and Doc Da Trang, Van Ninh commune. At the same time, the province has encouraged farmers to develop industrial farming models instead of extensive farming or renovated extensive farming ones. Total aquaculture output in the first nine months of this year was put at 5,400 tonnes.

Black tiger shrimp farming occupies the largest area for aquaculture. The province has 5,000 hectares for black tiger shrimp farming, including 800 hectares for intensive farming and 4,300 hectares for semi-intensive farming. The first half’s total output reached only 2,000 tonnes, equal to 90 per cent of the same period last year.  

Fry production is an advantage of Khanh Hoa province with 1,000 farms. Total shrimp fry output in the first nine months of this year was 2,640 shrimp post-larvae. The province is building a concentrated area for production and testing black tiger shrimp fries, capable of producing between 10 billion and 15 billion fries per year, in Cam Lap and Cam Ranh communes. Also, the completion of the building of the Ninh Loc experimental farm in Ninh Hoa district will enable the examination of good fry sources for aquaculture development in Khanh Hoa province and other localities nationwide. Despite a limit in fresh water surface, Khanh Hoa has developed 1,200 hectares of ponds for aquaculture thanks to well-developed irrigation works to farm some specific seafood species, such as lobster, sweet snail, mytilus smaragdinus, arca, holothurian and sea eel. The caged farming of lobsters has also seen a stable development. Khanh Hoa province has produced pearl oysters at the Saigon Pearl Company, which exported 1.1 million pearl oysters to Japan last June, earning US$246,000.

High quality seafood processing

Khanh Hoa’s seafood processing has seen the most rapid development in Vietnam. Especially, during the doi moi process, having considered seafood export a driving force for the whole fisheries sector, the province has issued policies and mechanisms to attract foreign investors. Last year alone, Khanh Hoa had three new plants with a total investment capital of US$12 million. These include the 100 per cent foreign-owned canned product company of Natfish, a high-end seafood processing plant of the Central Vietnam Seaprodex Company and the Cam Ranh Seafood Plant in Cam Ranh.

Over the past few years, local enterprises have concentrated on upgrading their equipment and production lines with modern technology, meeting requirements for export to the EU and the US. So far, the province has had four plants granted with code for export to the EU. By late September 2004, total processing output for export had reached 16,000 tonnes of major products, including frozen shrimps, mollusc and fish, and other dried products. The province had produced 3.8 million litres of fish sauce and 1,100 tonnes of dried products of all kinds for the domestic demand. Export turnover of the Khanh Hoa fisheries sector has seen a rapid increase with US$150 million in nine months.      

Fishing support service development

With a large area for fishing, total output in Khanh Hoa reaches 66,000 tonnes per year. In nine months of this year alone, the figure was put at 44,000 tonnes. Khanh Hoa now has 5,000 fishing boats and ships with a total capacity of 125,000 CV.  In the past few years, the province has developed many projects on fishing support infrastructure facilities, including the Hon Ro fishing port, bringing total fishing ports in the province to nine, the upgrading the Da Bac-Cam Ranh fishing port, the building of the southern seafood market of Central Vietnam in Hon Ro, Nha Trang city, with a total investment of VND 13 billion (about US$823,827) and the building of infrastructure facilities of fishing support service complex in Northern Hon Ong with a total investment of VND 89 billion (about US$5.64 million). 

Solutions for sustainable development needed

The most urgent issue of Khanh Hoa in fisheries is environmental pollution in both fishing and aquaculture. The development of areas and techniques for aquaculture, which cannot meet the conditions for a safe environment and water treatment, has broken the ecological balance, resulting in a fall in economic effectiveness. Therefore, in the future, the province will continue to implement many solutions to improve the environment while educating farmers on environmental protection.

Aquaculture earns high economic effectiveness, but for a sustainable development, all activities from fry production to care techniques, disease prevention, harvesting and product processing should be implemented in a harmonious manner.

The province will encourage its enterprises to invest in upgrading equipment and technology to increase the quality of their products and diversify goods for export and domestic demand. In particular, the province will create favourable conditions for enterprises to build their trademarks to increase the value of goods, building up their images among customers. 

• Thi Oanh