Australia set to double prawn harvest with financial grant

An AU$500,000 grant will be used to advance a programme of introducing Elite Giant Tiger Prawns to Australian prawn farmers to help double their yields within three years, according to Minister for Regional Development and Industry Desley Boyle.
 

Through the use of advanced genetic technologies, scientists were able to selectively breed fast-growing and healthy prawns that possess the genetic markers for success in terms of size, taste and the ability to thrive, unlike the unpredictability of wild stocks, Boyle said.

The technology will further assist Queensland's aquaculture industry to continue to be environmentally sustainable while providing high quality seafood to meet a growing demand for tiger prawns in Southeast Asia, Boyle said.

Boyle said the production of large farmed prawns, especially Black Tiger Prawns, have subsided significantly, and that increasing farm yields for Queensland farmers will give them a market advantage and boost the state's aquaculture industry.

The funding will allow the CSIRO to expand its work with Gold Coast Marine Aquaculture (GCMA) to include additional farms, including Seafarm and Australian Prawn Farms.

Project leader Nigel Preston said Queensland prawn farmers produced an average of 3,200 tonnes of prawns worth AU$50 million per year.

The GCMA has an annual production capacity of more than 400 tonnes of prawn, but it is working towards increasing the farms' percentage of domesticated prawns from 30 percent this year to 60 percent in 2009.