Goa’s coastline shows potential for fish culture with scope for installing as many as 30 lakh cages for fish production, Union fisheries minister Giriraj Singh said on Sunday. To begin with 1,000 cages will be set up in Goa, he said. In addition, “there are enough reservoirs in Goa, including mining ones. We will start cage culture there, too. Nowhere is there space available for cage culture like in Goa. We only need seed and feed links”, Singh said.
He said that Goa, despite the immense and unmatched potential of its coast, falls short of fish for consumption during the fishing ban. The state’s fish processing units also depend on supply from Maharashtra and Karnataka. Cage culture will ensure that Goa not only meets its requirement for consumption and fish processing units, but will also become one of the biggest fish exporters in the country, he said.
“Goa has the capacity to produce the highest quantity of fish in the country and the quality of this fish produced through cage culture will be of export quality,” said Singh. The state currently produces 1 lakh tonne of fish, he said. “The National Institute of Oceanography (NIO) has carried out a survey showing that cage culture is possible in 200sq km into the sea. When we discussed this with the Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute (CMFRI) regional centre in Tamil Nadu, they said cage culture can safely be carried out in 72 sqkm by ensuring that tourism and fishing activities are safeguarded. I cannot even imagine it has the capacity for 30 lakh cages to be installed in all. It will provide a new model of marine culture,” said Singh. He said that the use of cage culture will mean that fishing boat workers do not have to go through the hardships of living at sea for eight to 10 days and will also save on diesel costs. There is also a lot of scope for inland fisheries in Goa, for which about Rs 65 crore will be provided inland for Biofloc, Recirculating Aquaculture Systems (RAS) and Reservoir Cage Culture. State fisheries minister Filipe Nery Rodrigues said that this will really be useful in making Goa self-sufficient.
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