Use of wild fish and other aquatic organisms as feed in aquaculture in the Asia-Pacific 117
significantly over the last decade, and that freshwater fish accounts for about
20–25 percent of the animal protein intake, particularly in rural
populations in the developing world. It has even been suggested that farmed fish will
become a nutritionally necessary alternative to meat (Sargent and Tacon, 1999). With
the near stagnation of wild-caught fish supplies, the increasing demand for foodfish
will have to be met by aquaculture; the issue is how much of the shortfall can be met
by increased aquaculture production. Currently, 50 percent of foodfish demands are
met by the aquaculture sector (FAO, 2006b); but can this proportion grow and if so,
by how much?
Fish has become one of the largest exported commodities of developing countries,
with exports having shown a continuing rise from US$4.6 billion in 1984 to US$20.4
billion in 2004, an increase that is considerably higher than that shown by traditionally
exported commodities such as rice, coffee and tea (Kurien, 2005; FAO, 2007). Among
the top-ten fish exporting nations in the world are three Asian countries, China,
Thailand and Viet Nam. Viet Nam registered an increase of 17.4 percent in annual
growth for the period 1994–2004 (FAO, 2007), the largest contribution being from
the aquaculture sector, primarily catfish and shrimp farming. The catfish farming
sector in Viet Nam employs an estimated 160 000 to 170 000 people (over 80 percent
of them women), within the relatively small geographical area of the Mekong Delta,
contributing significantly to food security and poverty alleviation in this region (Phan
et al., 2009).
As evident from the data presented previously, aquaculture has shown considerable
growth over the last two decades and hence its current importance as a means of
addressing global foodfish needs. It was also evident that the proportion of the different
cultured commodities has remained relatively static, the increased volumes in each of
the commodities meeting the demands of the growing social strata. The Asia-Pacific,
overall, has witnessed significant economic growth during the last decade, resulting in
a higher proportion of “disposable income” in significant numbers of the population.
Such changes result in different consumer demands (Gehlhar and Coyle, undated),
including those related to fish consumption (De Silva, 2001).
Cultured marine species (especially groupers) have a high market demand in the
region that, barring unforeseen global calamities, is likely to grow (Sim, 2005) by
catering to an increasing middle class while also contributing to food security for
small-scale producers. In meeting the increased demand for these relatively high-
valued species, a certain degree of compromise is needed in the use of exhaustible
resources and the potential effects of the sector on the environment. Such compromises
may be accompanied by improvements to the technologies and practices that impact
natural resource usage, reducing environmental effects to a minimum. There is a
need to minimize the direct use of trash fish/low-value fish in marine fish culture
by encouraging fish farmers to use formulated feeds, which have significantly lesser
dependence on trash fish/low-value fish and higher overall environmental integrity.
The aquaculture sector in the region has to improve its collaboration with the feed
industry. One area of aquafeed development that has not kept pace in the region is the
use of animal industry by-products in feed formulation. This could be due to the fact
that the animal processing industries (apart from the poultry industry) are relatively
less centralized than in the west. Consequently, there is no large-scale production
of blood meal and bone meal. However, this problem could be solved by improved
dialogue between sectors and targeted research.
In Asia, almost all aquaculture, as is the case of most agriculture, is small scale,
rural and clustered. These small holdings, which are often farmer owned, operated and
managed, generate synergies and work in harmony (Figure 23). In the case of marine
finfish culture, there is an urgent need to encourage these smallholders to adopt better
feed management practices, commencing with a shift from using trash fish/low-value