rockdamn:

Good article. But would just like to highlight some things more relevant to Malaysia.

The organization I represent has been trying to attract FDIs into Malaysia aquaculture for years (aside from other biotech investments), and most companies engaged are hessitant. Apart from feed costs, the other key turn-off factor is the lack of cold-chain logistics. Unlike our neighbours in Thailand and Vietnam, Malaysia does not have a system of production, or even regulations that conforms to EU/US standards. For instance, the EU regulation requires that all harvested fish be gutted, UV treated, packaged, and frozen within 6 hours. How many producers in Malaysia actually practice that? Heck, we don't even have a national guideline for this either!

I had the opportunity to see for myself how the Vietnamese do aquaculture, and I can say, Malaysia is easily 10 years behind them, despite starting earlier than them, and have better access to technology and funds. Till today, we are still arguing about which species of fish to focus on, while neglecting the other more important issues. We are also so low on the productivity scale, we might as well go plant coconuts (often called the "lazy-man's crop" due to it little need for management). Let me just give some examples:

(i) In Vietnam, they can produce 1.35 million tons of basa/tra/sutchii on 6,000ha of land (ave: 225,000kg/ha); Malaysia's entire aquaculture production on 50,000ha land produced about 7.1 million tons last year (142,000kg/ha)

(ii) When WWF and some NGOs started claiming that Vietnamese aquaculture was not sustainable and unable to meet EU standards of food safety, the Vietnamese government and Aquaculture Producers Association immediately went to work to address the problem and change public perception. 90% of the farms were certified within 1 year, for both sustainability and EU food safety standard.

Of course, that does not mean Malaysia aquaculture is doomed. There are some examples of success, such as Trapia and some integrated patin farms up north and on the east coast. Then there's also Fish Protech in Sepang, an indoor aquaculture system farming jade perch.

I believe Malaysia can be a good destination for high-valued fish products. One such fish is in fact the jade perch. It is comparable to the sea perch (siakap) in versatility and toughness, and has good feed conversion ratio, despite being a purely fresh water fish. The only exception is that it has a very high retail price tag at present, about RM35 per kg. However, in order to make this work, the entire value chain has to be built, meaning an integrated approach has to employed. And this, sadly, has to come solely from the producers themselves. Yes, it will mean very high investments, but if done properly, the returns are equally good.

Hi MrFarmer,

thank you for your help. will PM you for the file.

Just found out from Joel that its called anthracnose leaf blight

i checked it out with the picture and it is quite similar with the one i researched online.

thanks Joel