Naro; Big Boost to Fish Industry
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The Monitor (Kampala)
EDITORIAL
April 2, 2004
Posted to the web April 2, 2004
Kampala
The National Agricultural Research Organisation (Naro) has disclosed that they successfully generated a friendly species of the Nile Perch.
This new fish type can apparently be fed on non-meat substances unlike its natural cousin, which is carnivorous and is voraciously consuming other smaller fish to the point that some species are staring extinction in the face.
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Naro has been doing some useful things on the quiet and the results of their hard work are beginning to show.
The organisation also revealed that they are making advances in improving the already domesticated Tilapia species with a version that is cost-friendly and offers new possibilities to the fish farming industry.
Uganda is already fairly well placed in the fish export market and there is real potential for greater things if this natural resource is harnessed with more focus.
The private sector working on its own cannot return optimum benefits to the country because it does not have adequate capacity.
Fish farmers, for instance, have been complaining about the high operating costs. They can be helped if government more actively interested itself in the sub-sector by making strategic interventions.
Fish is one of those non-traditional exports that in a very short time has become the second leading foreign exchange earner for the country.
By 2002 fish exports were yielding $ 89 million although in the last two years this figure has oscillated because of the stiff competition from Chinese and Vietnamese products that are being dumped in the European market.
Competition has always been the stimulus for invention and as in the generation of this new species there is a pressing need that we innovate in ways that can leave our competitors 'naked'.
It has been reported that Uganda's fish fraternity are mulling over the idea of registering the Nile Perch as a patent of this country with the World Trade Organisation; this is a healthy idea.
The Chinese and Vietnamese clearly are more organised than us in the fish farming business and have more flexible capacity to deliver in large capacity.
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However, we can hold our own if we took advantage of our comparative advantage, which at the moment rests in a higher quality fish.
Well done Naro.
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