CATFISH, popularly called Mudfish and or Adwene in Akan is the
most popular fish in places like Nigeria, Benin and Togo and commands
much more respect than Tilapia does in Ghana. It is traditionally served
in beer bars in plates of hot spicy pepper soup (what I got to taste
had more aromatic spices than pepper, but maybe that was just the Ibadan
recipe, or better still I may have chanced a bad cook at the hotel).
In Ghana,
CATFISH is most popular amongst the Akans and a selection of
ethnicities in the Volta Region. In fact many, other ethnic groups taboo
it as there are many superstitions making the rounds. There are
varieties of the species though that are popular amongst all Ghanaians,
these include the smoked fish common in most markets called the
'gearbox'or Chrysichthys and nigrodigitatus. The 'gearbox' variety is strangely though not well researched
for farming. This may be because the Original African Catfish (Clarias gariepinus)
has been adopted worldwide for fish farming. Presently, China farms
more African Catfish than all of Africa can produce, funny uh?
My
purpose is to show the commercial viability of catfish culture, the
risks and reasons why tilapia seems to have more preference amongst fish
farmers.
Catfish unlike tilapia are cannibalistic. That is to say
they eat other fishes or anything small enough to enter their mouths.
Now this happens mostly when the fish are not well fed. If you stocked
1000 tilapia fingerlings and did not feed them properly you may lose up
to hundred fingerlings due to natural factors. On the other hand if you
did same with catfish fingerlings the more aggressive ones would have
some of their siblings for lunch and as they get bigger they have a
bigger appetite to eat even more smaller ones. The result is that out of
1000 catfish fingerlings stocked you may be lucky to count up to 200 if
you neglected them for even three weeks. If well fed though from the
beginning they tend not to eat each other after they gain a certain
weight.
Now it must be obvious to you why so many people prefer the more
predictable tilapia to farm in Ghana. Our brothers in Nigeria and my former employer (CGL) in Ghana however
prefer the catfish because it grows evidently faster and has a great
market even when smoked. What’s more the price stays stable all year
round and at best goes up once in a while when demand is too high. They
are successful in this venture because they know what profits lie ahead
and thus invest heavily in startup feed for the young fish up to a stage
where they won't cannibalize each other and then they resort to cheaper
local home made feed or agricultural wastes.
Now to the figures.
Catfish sells at ₦450 (GHC4.5) per kilogram in Nigeria, a typical fish
fed for five to six months may weigh between 1 to 3 kilograms or an
average of 2 kilograms. In Ghana, the price is GHC 5 per kilogram in the
Ashanti region, GHC 7 - 10 in Accra, and GHC 5 - 10 in the Eastern
region. The Central and Western regions sometimes record prices as high
as GHC 15 per kilogram, although in most cases they have similar prices
as in Accra. The price is highly unstable and inclined to rise because
the number of catfish farmers and their production is very small.
So
imagine you took the risk and successfully produced 10,000 catfish each
weighing 1 kilogram culminating in 10 tons. How and where would you
sell them? Because the market isn't as well developed as tilapia, market
women may try to cheap the farmer who wants to quickly sell off his or
her fish and make back some profit. It won't also be practical to decide
to sell off your fish in bits at a time because each day of delay
increases the risk of losses to poachers and natural causes. This is
where the exporter comes in! Currently the few exporters on my directory
buy a kilogram of live catfish for GHC 3.4. This may be too low
compared to the market value of a kilogram, but the exporter offers the
opportunity to sell your fish stock at one go and receive payment
instantly irrespective of how many thousands of tons you may have
produced.
BUDGET
10,000 catfish fingerlings @30Ghp each
GHC 3000
Feed 100 bags @GHC 40
each GHC 4000
Labour @ GHC300 month/6months
GHC 1800
TOTAL
GHC
8800
SALES = 10,000 kilograms X GHC 3.5 =
GHC 35,000
PROFITS = SALES - INVESTMENT =
GHC 26,200
I USED
AN AVERAGE OF 1 KILOGRAM PER FISH FOR WORST CASE SCENARIOS, IT IS MORE
REGULAR THOUGH TO GET A WEIGHT OF 1.5KG - 2 KG WITH A BUDGET SUCH AS THE
ONE ABOVE. THIS WOULD MEAN THAT THE SALES OF GHC 35,000 COULD BE EITHER
GHC 52,500 OR GHC 70,000 ACCORDINGLY. FROM THESE YOU COULD SUBTRACT
YOUR INVESTMENT TO GET YOUR NEW PROFIT. SHOCKED HUH? PRECISELY WHY THE
MONEY LOVING NIGERIANS PREFER CATFISH!
Note that, you could
cut down on the budget by investing in for instance 50 bags of feed till
the fish attain a size which makes it unlikely for them to eat each
other and then you feed them with leftover agricultural waste or the
cassava dough formulations some farmers use. I have quoted 100 bags
though for those who are well capitalized. In any case you won't be
spending the whole amount at a go on feed as it would be accumulated
over the six month period.
NOTE HOWEVER THAT FROM MY OWN EXPERIMENT IT WOULD COST YOU USD 1.25 OR GHS 2.6 PRESENTLY (DECEMBER 2012)TO GROW ONE CATFISH ON ONLY EXTRUDED FEED TO A KILOGRAM IF IT'S A GOOD BREED.
I have left out the cost of
constructing the ponds or buying canvas tanks because I realize the charges vary by location
and nature of soil. An excavator though would do a better and faster
job. Or equally one could invest in a lot of cages (an expensive option:
cage farming is cheaper for tilapia as they can be crowded, but same
won't work with catfish thus necessitating more cages and more
expenditure).
Like I always say, fish farming is second only to
narcotic drugs in terms of profits because very little effort is needed
but great risk is undertaken in both. Getting a consultant to walk you
through the steps eliminates much of the risk. After learning from the
consultant in your first trail you are pretty much well positioned to go
independent because trust me there is nothing complex to it!
