WAAPP: Fishery scientists develop new technologies

For two days, fishery scientists from three research institutes in the country met in Ilorin, the Kwara State capital few days ago to present what they have developed to renowned fishery stakeholders in the West African sub-region.The scientists are from the National Institute for Fresh Water Fisheries Research (NIFFR), New Bussa, Niger State; Nigerian Institute […]

For two days, fishery scientists from three research institutes in the country met in Ilorin, the Kwara State capital few days ago to present what they have developed to renowned fishery stakeholders in the West African sub-region.
The scientists are from the National Institute for Fresh Water Fisheries Research (NIFFR), New Bussa, Niger State; Nigerian Institute of Oceanography and Marine Research (NIOMR), Victoria Island, Lagos and the Nigerian Stored Product Research Institute (NSPRI), Ilorin Kwara State.
The researches have been commissioned by the West Africa Agricultural Productivity Project (WAAPP) funded by the World Bank to specifically develop economically effective and cheap technologies that would benefit small-scale and large-scale fish farmers and processors in West Africa.
The developed technologies were in the areas of high performance fingerlings productions, effective feeds, smoking kilns for fish processing and standard packaging materials for fish marketing, to meet international standard.
In fingerlings production, WAAPP asked the scientists to solve the problem of scarcity of good quality gravid catfish brood stock for fingerlings production by farmers in Nigeria especially in the dry season.
This is because during the dry season or adverse weather conditions, catfish brood stocks reabsorb their eggs and milt, making it difficult for successful breeding. The situation is further compounded by the kind of fish feed used by farmers, which do not enhance egg development and maturation.
Dr Moses Yisa, one of the researchers from NIFFR from New Bussa, presented the new fingerlings, various species of tilapia technologies which, he said, ‘have high growth rates and are ready for adoption by farmers in Nigeria and West Africa.”
A Principal Investigator at the Nigerian Institute for Oceanography and Marine Research, Victoria Island, Lagos Megbowon Iwalewa, who worked on improving growth performance of fingerlings of clarid species through intra-specific hybridisation, discovered that the breeding performance of natural populations of catfish performed better than domesticated strains cultured in Nigerian farms.
According to the researcher, this probably is due to the introduction of Dutch strain brought to Nigeria from the Netherlands whose gene pool has mixed with our indigenous domesticated catfish.
In respect to feeds, Dr. L. M. O Ibiyo  who led other team of scientists working on the development of cost effective fishmeal from local aquatic resources  (clupeids and lantern fish),  said the results indicate that clupeids fish meal is a good local resource that can replace foreign fish meal with maintenance of good growth performance of fish.
She said the new feed technology will lead to reduction in feed cost with total use of local resources. “A bag of foreign fish feed, which  sells at N5,600 -N5,800 in New Bussa can be produced with 4,000-N4,200,” Dr Ibiyo said.
In the same vein, researchers from Nigerian Institute for Oceanography and Marine Research, Lagos presented the evaluation of local fish feed on gonadal retention in catfish for all year fingerling production, which was designed to examine the effect of feed and environmental factors on egg and milt maturation and retention in catfish brood stock of Heterobranchus longifilis  and Clarias gariepinus.
This was aimed at solving the problem of re-absorption of eggs and poor milt quality that occurs during the dry season or when brood stock are not well fed.
In terms of fish processing, scientists at the Nigerian Stored Product Research Institute, Ilorin and their counterparts from National Institute for Fresh Water Fisheries Research (NIFFR), New Bussa, have also developed a more effective fish smoking kilns which are ready to be used by fish processors.
Engr. F. F. Olayemi, of NSPRI while explaining the technology to experts said the product, which is mounted on a set of four wheels for easy of mobility especially by the womenfolk is environmentally friendly.
The smoking kilns can be dismounted into eight parts and has a temperature gauge to monitor the drying temperature and an oil collector unit that allows the oil oozing out from the fish to be collected.
The product uses three different power sources- electricity, gas and charcoal, which makes it easier for a user to choose which to use at a time.
The charcoal powered kiln has a combustion chamber that houses the charcoal box and a direct current fan that is operated with a rechargeable battery powered by a solar panel.
The essence of the fan is to enhance heat distribution within the kiln thereby ensuring even drying and at the same time reduce need for change of drying trays during operation.
In the gas powered kilns, the combustion chamber houses the gas burner that is coupled with the gas cylinder through a hose; while the electrical kilns have a combustion chamber consisting of two heating elements each (1.8 kilowatts and an alternate current fan).
The NIFFR scientists also said their design, construction and testing of the smoking kiln (which has the same feature with NSPRI’s) is now completed with final batch capacity to produce 50 kilograms of smoking fish at a time. Their smoking kilns weight 58 kilograms and cost N60,000.
The scientists have also developed effective solar fish dryers for the production of stock fish and other dry fish varieties.
Dr  F. F. Olayemi of NSPRI while commenting on the packaging materials developed, said the product provides a  barrier against dirt and other contaminants thus keeping it clean, preventing losses and protecting fish against physical and chemical damage such as  harmful effects of air, light, or insects.
WAAPP which sponsored the researches hoped that the products would get to the end users as soon as possible to mitigate the problem facing farmers in the fishery sector.