There was so much research done, studies conducted, model farm demonstration done to encourage the Sub-Saharan, east, middle, west & south African farmers to venture into aquaculture so that they can feed their nations. But unfortunately, most of the farming models are high capital intensive, highly technical and finally producing fish at high cost of production. W e, as a responsible Danish seafood trading company have tried to demonstrate a model farming in Ghana which produces fish with basic technology, hormone free, with balanced nutrition, creating more jobs.
Cage culture in Ghana has been facing lot of issues from organized theft, high mortalities due to streptococcus, ISKNV etc. It is mostly like “cage culture is lacking both security and biosecurity safety in Ghana” . At that critical situation we have invested in commercial pond farming with 2-tier system of Nursery (20% area out 1 Ha) and Grow-out (80% area out of 1 Ha) and we stocked 1 g size sex reversed fingerlings in nursery, grown them for 90 days where they have reached 90-100 g size and then transferred to grow-out ponds and grown them there for another 90-120 days. Overall, we have maximized output 3 times from a unit area. We produce 30 tons/Ha/year with an accessory aeration of 3-5 Hours in a day (2 AM to 7 AM). Effective harvest size is 400-450 g with 98-100% survival in Grow-out and 60-70% in Nursery Pond.
After ISKNV has hit Ghana in 2019 with severe mortality, we have faced mortality in nursery ponds almost loosing 90% in some of the nursery ponds, but our grow-outs were not affected which still maintained 98-100% survival. We have used some organic products, stopped hormone usage since hormone usage suppresses immunity and we have applied Darwin theory of survival for fittest at nursery stages achieving 40-50% survival compared to 5-10% survival in other farms, and achieved 100% survival in grow-out consistently in our farm. We give a maximum time of 90-120 days for fish to breed in grow-out culture where the fingerlings can attain a maximum size of 10 g by the time of harvest and that fish will be distributed to village people either for free or for nominal price.
Overall, we achieved lowest FCR, lowest cost of production, low carbon footprint, low Nitrogen emission, low phosphate emission by having control on feed and by substituting formulated feeds with natural food (plankton). Our laborious method of harvest makes theft impossible, even it happens that will be negligible quantity.
We are marching towards export of whole round tilapia to regional markets in Africa and fresh frozen tilapia fillet to rest of the western world at a on par price match with Asian products. The numbers, graphs, and technical data will be presented in full version of the paper.