Catfish prices have continued to rise in the Mekong Delta after the Vietnamese New Year on February 17, reaching a record level of nearly VND17,000 (US$1.06) per kilogram.
Some businesses said the low output of tra and basa catfish on farms this year forced their prices up.
The higher prices have encouraged more farmers in the delta to invest in expanding their fish farms, also forcing up breeding stock prices considerably. It now costs VND2,200 to VND4,000 per fry.
Last year Vietnam exported tra and basa to 65 countries and territories, earning a record $700 million. The major markets included the European Union which bought almost half its exports, Russia, and the US.
The country plans to earn US$1 billion from catfish exports this year, said Ngo Phuoc Hau, chairman of the Vietnam Association of Seafood Exporters and Processors (VASEP)’s Mekong Fresh Fish Committee.
Tra and basa from Vietnam together with tuna and tilapia had changed American and European eating habits, the Vietnamese Ministry of Fisheries quoted the Fisheries Information System, a commercial fishing industry web site, as saying.
The news heartens farmers, processors, and exporters of catfish who have been buffeted by price volatility and the lawsuit filed by US catfish farmers.
Tra and basa, inhabitants of the Mekong River in Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, and Thailand, were brought for cultivation to ponds, lagoons, and rivers in Vietnam’s southern An Giang and Dong Thap provinces in the middle of the last century. Scientists started artificially breeding tra in 1978 and basa in 1990.
Nowadays, the catfish are bred in half the Mekong Delta provinces besides several central and northern provinces. Its cultivation and processing have created jobs for thousands of farmers.
With support from EUROGAP, a Swiss organization issuing quality certification for aquatic produce, VASEP and the Vietnam Aqua Service Company have been working on quality standards for Vietnamese catfish.
The task is expected to be completed this year. (Young People)
Vietnamese
