April 19, 2007

Vietnam's Can Gio pilots environmental project for shrimp 
 

The coastal district of Can Gio in Vietnam's Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC) is preparing for a pilot project to minimise the impact on diseases and improve the quality on shrimp farming. 

The project, called "Good Aquaculture Practice" or GAP made by the Ministry of Fisheries has been applied successfully in Binh Dai Commune in the Mekong Delta province of Ben Tre for the last several years.

The HCMC Department of Agriculture and Rural Development has decided to carry out the project in Can Gio in an effort to reduce the risk of farmed shrimp dying due to diseases such as the white spot syndrome virus and yellow head.

The GAP, which is slated for three years, covers some 40 hectares of some 45 shrimp farms owned by 18 farmers in Ly Nhon Commune.

The department's technicians will work with farmers and provide them with guidance and techniques such as farm preparation, choosing and breeding shrimp, the use and management of chemicals and bio-products for water treatment and shrimp feeding as well as wastewater treatment.

The GAP project encourages farmers to raise shrimp for one season a year, which begins in the end of March or early April deemed to be the best time for growing shrimp. After that, farmers will be able raise crabs or keo fish to change the farm's environment. According to Truong Trung Thu of the Division of Fisheries under the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development in HCMC, the process can effectively control diseases.

Cases of shrimp mortalities are increasing and have occurred in several provinces such as Bac Lieu, Soc Trang and Can Gio because shrimp is raised in the off-season.

Some farmers living nearby, after several years of experience with shrimp, are taking a wait-and-see attitude toward the project.

The Can Gio region has some 6,000 hectares under scattered shrimp farming in Ly Nhon, An Thoi Dong, Binh Khanh and Tam Thon Hiep communes. The district converted rice fields into shrimp farms in 1998.