Angola is strongly engaged in the development of aquaculture to improve per capita fish consumption to reach desired levels worldwide.
The Aquaponics pilot project combined cultivation of fish and plants, in a symbiotic environment using conventional methodology in fish farming of the Thai or Redbreast Tilapia (Coptodon rendalli) in an aquaponics system. This approach was implemented at the ECOCENTER PEIXES, Lda, Research Pilot Center, in order to obtain greater yield with the use of this technology.
Aquaponics is an excellent plant production system that uses wastewater from fish farming to fertilize the plants and thereby, avoids the emission of ammonia and nitrogenous compounds into the environment. It also allows better extraction and use of the remaining nutrients from the feed, concentrated at the bottom of the fish farming tanks.
In this pilot project, 12 breeders of Coptodon rendalli were used, weighing 250 to 300 g on average, in a 3m3 circular tank, with a 1000 L biofilter, 0.5 CV electric pump and 200 L decanter.
To feed the fish, a compound with local raw materials was used as an alternative feed ingredient, based on cornflour, cassava corn meal, rice bran, mucua, soy beans, coconut oil, leaves of Amaranthus caudatus, sweet potato and Moringa oliefera, and, as animal protein, fish meal of Sardinella aurita, insect larvae of Catato angolensis, which provided a food conversion rate of 1.5 kg of feed to 1.0 kg of fish biomass during 8 months of closed and recycled cultivation.
The results showed rapid growth of vegetables, Lettuce and Mint, in 45 and 60 days without the use of soil or pesticides, and a high average yield of the species under cultivation.
Excellent yields were also achieved in terms of vegetable growth, with the replacement of Redbreast Tilapia by the Catfish Clarias gariepinus, finally concluding that the combination of aquaculture with agriculture is a perfect symbiosis for the environment and a strong and sustainable blue economy.
Angolan demography is growing, and encouraging aquaculturists to cultivate organic fish and plants in combination, as they are alternative foods with high sources of animal and vegetable protein, to provide sustainable food for the Angolan population is the main challenge of this work.