3 minute read
Blue Food Innovation Summit. London, UK, June 14-15
Shrimp 2022 was the 6th INFOFISH world trade conference and exhibition, a hybrid conference held in Putrajaya, Malaysia, from June 8-10. The event organised by the Malaysian-based Infofish (www. infofish.org), had 249 participants, both virtual and in-person, with 35 speakers and 33 exhibitors (14 physical and 19 virtual) from 33 countries. It was jointly hosted by Malaysia’s Fisheries Development Authority, the Network of Aquaculture Centres in the Asia Pacific (NACA) and China’s Aquatic Products Processing and Marketing Alliance (CAPPMA). The conference chair was Jose Antonio Camposano, Executive President, National Chamber of Aquaculture, Ecuador. Shrimp 2022 focused on “Recovery through resilience and innovation”, reflecting the difficult challenges for the global shrimp industry over the pandemic years (2020-2021).
The keynote address by FAO’s Dr Audun Lem, Deputy Director, Fisheries Division was on “Resilience, Innovation and resurgence in the global shrimp industry: What is next.” The major challenges are rising production costs – soy prices have risen by 20% and energy costs are soaring. High freight costs continue to be a reality for exporters. Although much lower than before, they remained high due to the low availability of cargo space. The reopening of the Chinese economy and surging oil prices could raise costs again.
In 2022, Lem expected demand for shrimp products to go up with easing of restrictions in the food service segments, although major markets predict lower growth rates. Inflation is reducing consumers’ income. However, the long perspective is positive, with strong underlying demand, new product forms and a dynamic service sector boosting demand.
The conference had an extensive program which began with a session on production and markets trends (pages 16-19), followed by sessions covering technology for intensification of culture, innovations for high productivity, aquafeed and nutrition, sustainability
Malaysian stakeholders attending Shrimp 2022. Tuan Syed Omar (seated left) with Yip Kam Toh (seated right) and the team at Charoen Pokphand Malaysia (From the left, Sean Lai Yoke Wai, Benedict Tan and Weerawut Hiranmateekul). Steven Goh (left) and Mathew Clark, Delst Asia. Goh discussed forensic feed science to address issues with gelatisation in feed pellets.
and social accountability, partnerships and investments and challenges over these pandemic years.
Technologies for higher productivity
In improving cost efficiency, Manoj M Sharma, Mayank Aquaculture, India, described the complex that he has built up with indoor facilities for a hatchery and nursery in Gujarat. With this multiphase farming, the cost of production for sizes 30-40/kg over 70-80 days was USD3.55/kg versus USD4.25/kg in a regular culture model. The cost difference was due to lower costs of feed, energy and less use of health products.
Daniel Gruenberg, Aquavative Technologies, Thailand and his team strongly believe in the sustainability of shrimp farming using recirculation aquaculture systems (RAS). He focussed on two lines of development, Super RAS and Phyto RAS. The latter is recommended for producer countries with low market prices, such as Thailand. Phyto RAS has low capital costs due to inexpensive construction. Usually, these are 5-10m wide and 100m long HDPE raceways under greenhouse sheeting. Compared to traditional pond systems, there is superior biosecurity and good water quality. Shrimp get nutrients from bioflocs and pelleted diets, giving better feed conversion ratios (FCRs). Shrimp have dark pigmentation. “Current densities are 3.75kg/m3 and the growth rate is more than 0.5g/day but with current genetics, we may reach 1g/day. We get 25g shrimp in less than 50 days and can do 12 crops/year in two-stage systems. So far, survival rates have been good at >95%.”
Benchmark Genetics’ Morten Rye gave some key trends in shrimp genetics. Selection for disease resistance is becoming important since viral and bacterial diseases have caused extensive losses. But geneticists need to be mindful of new pathogens. He explained how genomics selection is used for developing WSSVresistant shrimp with a realised response of 14% for WSSV. The next target trait is for AHPND survival. Over the last year, Benchmark is paying attention to animal welfare and that all maturation lines do not use ablation.
Innovations in shrimp farming
Dr Krishna R Salin, Asian Institute of Technology introduced some recent trends. The future for shrimp aquaculture is pathbreaking technologies (IoT, AI and blockchain) to move aquaculture from a traditional system to automation. Innovations already applied are smart sensors and real-time water quality monitoring in fish and shrimp farms.
