The officials of Marine Products Export Development Authority (MPEDA) has culled L-Vannami variety shrimp brood stock worth around Rs. 32 crore at its Brood Stock Multiplication Centre (BMC) in Visakhapatnam, with the Union Ministry for Agriculture not according permission for the sale of the stocks in time.
Rajiv Gandhi Centre for Aquaculture (RGCA), a research unit of the MPEDA, is running the BMC and is supplying Specific Pathogen Free (SPF) stocks to registered hatcheries across the country. However, farmers are forced to depend on private unregistered hatcheries owing to the delay in granting of permission from the Centre.
MPEDA imports post-larvae (PL) from Oceanic Institute, USA and the BMC staff develop the PL into brood stock and the mother prawns, which are Specific Pathogen Free (SPF) and free from 16 diseases.
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With the Centre failing to give the permission in the stipulated time, the MPEDA officials killed the stocks at the multiplication centre, as it would be expensive for them to cultivate the brood stock from it.
“We culled 8,000 L-Vannami brood stock recently. The RGCA staff usually raise the brood stock up to 40 grams and sell it to hatcheries to raise quality seed.
But, due to the delay, shrimps have grown up to 75 grams each, which is not suitable for breeding,” explained MPEDA Deputy Director S. Kandan.
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“The officials have brought the issue to the notice of Agriculture Minister P. Pulla Rao, Health Minister Kamineni Srinivas, and Municipal Minister P. Narayana during the aqua farmers and stakeholders’ meeting and the Ministers promised to take up the matter with the Union Ministers concerned,” Mr. Kandan told The Hindu.
However, some farmers allege foul play by some private and unauthorised hatchery owners, saying that the latter wanted the permission got delayed to ensure smooth sale of their stocks which was not disease resistant.
Aqua farmers S. Bhaskar Rao and B. Krishna complained that the seed procured from some private hatcheries had no growth and they suffered huge loss due to poor quality seed.
“I purchased seed worth around 3 lakh for raising shrimp in my four acres tank. But, the weight of prawns became less after 110 days,” said Ramakrishna, a shrimp grower from Bangarupalem in Visakhapatnam district.