January 17, 2011

Bangladeshi island seen to have bountiful seafood cultivation area

According to a survey, the cultivable land area in Bangladesh' Hatiya Upazila is around 83,097 acres in which some extended areas are suitable for shrimp and other fish cultivations.

There is a tremendous possibility of shrimp output in the surrounding marshes, ponds and other water bodies of Hatiya and Nizum Dwip at the estuary of the Bay of Bangal while every year at least one lakh tonnes of galda shrimp might be produced easily that may meet the country's demand for this delicacy.

Most of the Hatiya people are fish professionals and hard working in this respect. Though this region possesses a favourable environment for shrimp production yet for lack of government move shrimps are capriciously destroyed by the stray people.

There are huge shrimp fries in the water bodies and all around Hatiya the unscrupulous hunters catch them with the help of mosquito nets and one kind of especially made fry catching nets called 'Theta jal'.

It is further alleged that everyday some 15,000-16,000 people get into the rivers and marshes while thousands of fries are killed by them.

Besides, the jatka hunters catch a lot of small hilshas with their current nets and export them to other upazilas where they are sold and purchased in the open fish markets.

According to the local sources, everyday precious shrimp fry including other fishes worth a huge amount of money are ruined by the fish hunters.

On the other hand, the poor fish farmers who undertake to cultivate galda shrimp are held hostage by the money lenders who take away the fish from them for loan default giving them a nominal rate of only BDT50 (US$0.70) for per 100 pieces of shrimp fry.

If the government's fishery department takes the matter in hand, at least one lakh tonnes of galda shrimps can be produced that may play vital role in our national economy.