5. Selected issues facing fisheries and aquaculture in Asia and the Pacific

5.1 "Trash fish" catches

"Trash Fish" is a broadly used term that relates fish species that by virtue of their small size or low consumer preference have little or no commercial value. The use of the term "trash fish" varies among States and fisheries and can also change both seasonally and with location.

One category of "trash fish" includes species those that are not used for human consumption. They may be either landed, or discarded at sea. The landed portion of this type of trash fish is often composed of small fish that are targeted for processing into fish meal and oil or used for small-scale rural aquaculture and livestock raising. Japanese anchovy and chub mackerel are typical species that fall into this category. Those fish that have become damaged during fishing operations or in on-board storage can also be categorized in this group.

The other category of "trash fish" is low-value fish that are directly used for human consumption. The huge number of small-scale fisheries in the Asia-Pacific region generates a large quantity of this type of "trash fish", much of which is consumed or utilized locally as part of household food security, by way of artisanal processing. Utilization may be extremely efficient with nothing being wasted and a lot being converted through drying, fermenting and salting into a very wide range of human food products. In countries such as Bangladesh, almost all of fish caught is consumed.

The issues relating to these types of "trash fish" are different but interconnected. One major issue for the region is the increasing demand for "trash fish" for aquaculture and other animal feeds. Recognizing the potential effects of declines in marine capture fisheries, many governments have turned to aquaculture as a means to increase fish supply, provide employment and generate foreign income. Aquaculture development can be seen as a viable option to utilize "trash fish"; however, its demand for fish meal and "trash fish" can be seen as increasing fishing pressure on the already over-exploited fish stocks in the region. Over the last decade, the price of "trash fish" has risen considerably and it is predicted to increase over the next few years due to increased demand for fish meal and fish oil to meet market demands for aquaculture of carnivorous fish (as well as a source of affordable food). Declining stocks of many trash fish species such as Japanese anchovy, chub mackerel and filefish in China PR will aggravate the situation. Given that aquaculture is predicted to grow while capture fisheries remain stable, it will be difficult to meet the demand for trash fish.

Another issue relates to fish landed by larger industrial vessels. These fish are typically landed at a single point (port) and typically in a poor state of preservation or severely damaged by the capture method. Utilization of this fish is consequently very limited; either through conversion into fish meal or direct use for livestock or aquaculture in the general vicinity of the landing site. Would better post-harvest handling and processing yield a better return for this limited resource?

A linked issue is the capture of juvenile fish of potentially important commercial species (so-called "growth overfishing"). Trash fish currently constitute about 60 percent of the total trawl catch from the Gulf of Thailand and between 18 and 32 percent of trash fish are juveniles of commercially important fish species. Given a chance to grow to a larger size, these species would provide much more benefits, both in terms of production and more importantly in terms of value.

Before 1970, trash fish were caught mainly as a by-catch of trawling, set nets and drift nets. Although used as food in some poorer areas of the region, a lot of this fish was thrown back into the sea. With the decline in fish abundance in many seas of the region, and the shift from high trophic level to the more abundant lower trophic level species, trash fish increasingly became the target species.

The overall amount of trash fish actually landed in the Asia-Pacific region is not well known, but recent estimates from some States give an indication of the amount of trash fish currently being landed. In China PR, for example, the recorded trash fish production rose from 1.3 million tonnes in 1980 to over 5 million in 2002. In the South China Sea, the catch of trash fish exceeded 60 percent of the total marine production. Trash fish currently constitute about 60 percent of the total trawl catch from the Gulf of Thailand and between 18 and 32 percent of these trash fish are juveniles of commercially important fish species. In Viet Nam, some of the traditional gear is of very small mesh size leading to 30-80 percent of the catch coming from juvenile and trash fish. In Western Malaysia trawl landings consisted mainly of trash fish (51 percent), demersal fish (14.9 percent) and pelagic fish (13.3 percent).

Another indicator of trash fish production and utilization can also be derived from mariculture statistics. The cage culture of fish is typically reliant on the use of feeds rather than natural fertility of waters. Cage culture can therefore be separated into two types of operation - those using formulated fish feeds/pellets (which are typically based around fish meal) and those using 'trash fish' directly, the trash fish being obtained from trawler landings or from smallscale fisheries.

Use of "trash fish" for aquaculture in selected States^[32]

Bangladesh

Trash fish landings in Bangladesh are either utilized directly or converted into fish meal. It is estimated that 5 000-7 000 tonnes of trash fish are used for aquaculture in this way.

China PR

China PR is reporting declining trash fish catches since the late 1990s and this is already impacting on the price and availability of fishmeal. It is estimated that four million tonnes (2000) of "trash fish" are used directly for aquaculture, representing 72.3 percent of the trash fish landed in China PR. Trash fish are making up an increasingly large component of the marine fishery catch of China PR with a recent estimate of nearly 70 percent of the total catch being trash fish type species.

A rough estimate of the total fish meal requirement for aquaculture for China PR, based on reported production figures, ranges between 3.0 and 3.6 million tonnes. This figure is strongly influenced by assumed fish meal used for the culture of freshwater omnivorous species such as grass carp, common carp, crucian carp and tilapia. Further analysis of this particular part of the Chinese aquaculture sector is needed.

Domestic trash fish landings could provide one million tonnes of this usage and it is assumed that the rest is sourced from imports. The reported net fish meal usage^[33] for China PR in 2000 was nearly two million tonnes of which 806 thousand tonnes was national production^[34]. One estimate of future needs is that China will require about 13-18 million tonnes per year in the future but can only produce five million tonnes, leaving a large gap to be filled from imports.

Philippines

The estimated use of trash fish for aquaculture in the Philippines is 144 638 tonnes, of which an estimated 80 percent is used for marine cage culture.

Viet Nam

A recent study in Viet Nam concluded that there is rapidly increasing demand for trash fish for aquaculture. The total amount of trash fish used for aquaculture is estimated to be between 176 thousand and 323 thousand tonnes. In general, trash fish are a by-product of fishing for higher value fish with the exception of one fishery in southeast Viet Nam, where trash fish is the main target as this is more economic than fishing for larger species. Any future planned increases in aquaculture production will probably be constrained by the finite sources of feed fish.

5.2 Fish meal and other fish-based ingredients for aquaculture feed

The tables below present the 'apparent utilization' of fish-based feed ingredients in the Asia-Pacific region^[35]. The trends in the usage of fish meal for aquaculture and other sectors are stable in many States of the region (Figure 39).

It was recently estimated that the global aquaculture industry uses about 35 percent of total fish meal supply (Figure 40). This is a significant increase over estimated use in 1988. By 2010, the same author estimates the aquaculture share of fish meal usage will be 48 percent.^[36]

The trend in global production of fishmeal appears to be relatively stable and currently available information suggests that there is little likelihood of increasing total global production. This means that the expanding aquaculture and livestock sectors will be competing for a resource that is not increasing. This situation has been referred to as the "fish meal trap"^[37] and it is considered that given the apparently limited supply of fish meal and fish oil, the expansion of some types of aquaculture will be constrained (or stopped). It is argued that given stable (neither increasing nor decreasing) supplies of raw fish for fish meal production, the growing demand for fishmeal will drive the price of fish meal and fish oil upwards. This will eventually reach a level where fish and shrimp farmers may not be able to afford to buy fish feeds that contain adequate amounts of fish meal and fish oil to effectively produce their animals.

Table 23
Net fish meal usage in the Asia-Pacific region (2001)

These predictions assume that there will be little improvement in the efficiency of use of fish meal and fish, and that effective substitutes will not be found in the near future. It could be easily expected that the efficiency of the use of fishmeal will rise as a reaction to increasing prices and competition between the livestock and aquaculture sectors for the resource. It should be pointed out that to date, the greatest advances in the area of reducing reliance on fish meal appear to have been in the livestock sector. Considerable research is also being done to find substitutes including other sources of fish meal, and vegetable substitutes, including genetically modified plants.

Projections show that the rising cost of wild fish will also see aquaculture prices rising. The higher price for fish products may enable aquaculture to command a higher share of the fishmeal market. There is no doubt that the high value sector of aquaculture is growing and this sector is the most reliant on feeds containing fish meal and fish oil. Even within the aquaculture sector, there are likely to be shifts in feeding and feed composition since the freshwater aquaculture sector has a greater opportunity to use non-marine sourced feed ingredients (particularly slaughterhouse wastes, brewery wastes and agricultural milling by-products). The purchasing power of maricultured fish and crustaceans will enable this part of the sector to afford higher fish meal prices as demand increases.

Combining the total aquaculture production of carnivorous fish species and crustaceans cultured in all types of environments^[38], the approximate requirement for fishmeal for the Asia-Pacific region including China PR in 2000 was over 1.2 million tonnes. The fish meal requirement of freshwater fish aquaculture is far more difficult to estimate, since feeds vary from complete feeds containing fish meal to supplemental feeds with no fish meal whatsoever.

The inescapable conclusion is that even though fish prices will rise, the price of fishmeal will rise even more quickly and therefore there is considerable pressure on aquaculture to reduce its reliance on feeds containing fish meal and also to increase the efficiency of its current usage of this resource.

Figure 39
Usage of fishmeal for aquaculture and other sectors

Figure 40
Share of total fishmeal use

Source: Redrawn from

1) S.M. Barlow & I.H. Pike" SUSTAINABILITY OF FISHMEAL AND FISH OIL SUPPLY" Paper presented at the Scottish Norwegian Marine fish farming conference, University of Stirling, Stirling Scotland, June 2002

2) S.M. Barlow "THE WORLD MARKET OVERVIEW OF FISH MEAL AND FISH OIL" Paper presented to the 2nd Seafood By-Products Conference, Alaska, November 2002, http://www.iffo.org.uk

5.3 Live fish trade - food fish and ornamental aquarium fish

Fisheries dedicated to the live food and ornamental fish trade generate billions of dollars each year. The live reef fish trade has two main components - live food fish and ornamental aquarium fish. Accurate figures are not available on the total value of these trades, but extrapolation from partial estimates indicates that the total value of the aquarium trade exceeds US$ 1 billion per year.

There are environmental concerns regarding the manner in which aquarium and live reef food fish are exploited. The methods for collection and transportation can be wasteful, although for some areas this is one of the few commercially exploitable resources. The total annual net benefit of sustainable coral reef fisheries across Southeast Asia is estimated to be US$ 2.4 billion per year.

The marine and freshwater aquarium trade

In 2000, the global total wholesale value of live ornamental fish both freshwater and marine (live animals for aquarium only) was estimated at US$ 900 million, with an estimated retail value of US$ 3 billion (live animals for aquariums only). Asia provided more than 50 percent of the global total ornamental fish supply^[39].

Estimates place the value of the marine ornamental trade at US$ 200-330 million per year^[40] and the overall value of the marine fish trade, accounts for about 10 percent of the international ornamental fish trade (marine and freshwater included)^[41].

A total of 1 471 species of marine fish are traded world wide but the ten 'most traded' species account for about 36 percent of all fish traded for the years 1997 to 2002.

Southeast Asia is the hub of this trade, supplying up to 85 percent of the aquarium trade^[42]. In 1985, the world export value of the marine aquarium trade was estimated at US$ 25 million to 40 million per year. Since 1985, trade in marine ornamentals has been increasing at an average rate of 14 percent annually. In 1996, the world export value was about US$ 200 million. The annual export of marine aquarium fish from Southeast Asia alone was, according to 1997 data, between 10 million and 30 million fish with a retail value of up to US$ 750 million; the actual value at point of sale is considerably higher.

Ornamental marine species (corals, other invertebrates and fish) are collected and transported mainly from Southeast Asia, but also increasingly from several island nations in the Indian and Pacific Oceans, to consumers in the main destination markets: the United States, the European Union (EU) and, to a lesser extent, Japan.

Coral species in seven genera (Euphyllia, Goniopora, Acropora, Plerogyra, Catalaphyllia) are the most popular, accounting for approximately 56 percent of the live coral trade between 1988 and 2002. There were also 61 species of soft coral traded, amounting to close to 390 thousand pieces per year.

An important distinction that can be made between the freshwater and marine aquarium trades is the level of reliance on capture of animals rather than culture. It is roughly estimated that the freshwater aquarium trade relies on cultured animals for 98 percent and only two percent of the products are captured^[43]. The marine aquarium trade relies on capture for 98 percent of its production versus 2 percent culture^[44]. There is, therefore, significant potential for increasing the contribution of aquaculture to the marine aquarium trade and the freshwater aquarium trade is also a significant aquaculture contributor in terms of value. By calculation - if the freshwater aquarium trade makes up 90 percent of the total aquarium trade and 98 percent of that is cultured, then a crude estimate of the wholesale aquaculture value is approximately US$ 794 million.

There are increasing trends to certify the aquarium trade as "undertaken responsibly". There are opportunities for remote islands to benefit from this resource which is often one of the few livelihood options available to them.

Live finfish (groupers, wrasse etc.)

The markets for live groupers and other reef finfish are concentrated in Hong Kong SAR, Singapore and increasingly China PR.

In 2000, Hong Kong SAR alone imported an estimated 24 362 tonnes of live food fish. Typical wholesale prices for these species range from US$ 11 to 63 per kilogram. Overall average wholesale price for reef fish was US$ 20/kg^[45].

Table 24
Live fish imports to China PR, Hong Kong SAR, Macao SAR and Singapore in 2000

The very high retail values of these fish enable them to be brought long distances in well boats or to be transhipped and held in cages. These fish are sourced throughout Southeast Asia and also from the Pacific Islands. Estimates of the value of this trade vary. One estimate for Hong Kong SAR alone put the value at approximately US$ 400 to 500 million.

More recently the culture of groupers has been expanding as hatchery technology and transfer of this knowledge has enabled the establishment of grouper aquaculture. In particular, Indonesian aquaculture of grouper has increased notably in recent years.