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Tilapia culture by farmers in Luapula Province, Zambia

Year of publication 1992

Place of publication Rome, Italy ;

Pages p.74

Author Wijkstrom, U.N.,Wahlstrom, K.O.

Product type Project

Edition 1

Synopsis (short abstract) In 1988, ALCOM carried out a fish farmer survey in Luapula Province of Zambia in cooperation with the Department of Fisheries. Field work was done during June-August 1988. The purposes of the survey were: to describe the current situation of fish farmers and to find out how it can be improved; to identify the farmer who is likely to successfully raise fish in ponds; to describe how the farmers do that; and, to identify the constraints which farmers face. Agriculture in Luapula Provin ce is carried out at a subsistence level. Farmers spread their risks and assure their own sustenance by culturing several crops and by engaging in off-farm activities. A relatively small part of their total incomes is in the form of cash. About half of the adult male population in the province engage in capture fisheries or ancillary activities. In 1985 the production was estimated at about 23 000 tons. The conditions for fish farming are good. Land and water are available, and the population eat fish. About 280 farmers in the province engaged in fish farming in 1988. The survey was intended to cover about 25% of the practising farmers plus intending farmers. This meant a goal of 100 interviews. The survey was preceded by a Department of Fisheries census to identify existing (and past) farmers with fish ponds. The interviews were carried out during two visits in the course of June and August 1988. The survey team consisted of an aquaculturist and a social science graduate. Altogeth er 94 interviews were carried out of which 51 were with practising fish farmers, 20 with former fish farmers and 23 with potential fish farmers. The survey questionnaires were designed by ALCOM and slightly modified after their use in the North-Western Province.

Language English

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    In June 1989, ALCOM carried out a socio-economic study of the relationship between small-scale rural aquaculture and farming systems in Mwinilunga District, North-Western Province, Zambia. Informal interviews were held with 23 randomly selected fish farmer households. ALCOM's 1988 fish farmer survey in the province served as the background for a deeper study of production achievements, management practices, labour and resource allocations, harvesting strategies and disposal of harvested fish. The Farming Systems classifications defined by the Adaptive Research Planning Team (ARPT), the Zambian research body on farming systems, constituted the reference against which fish farming activities were investigated. There are two major farming systems in Mwinilunga District: “the traditional cassava-based subsistence shifting cultivation system”, encompassing the majority of households; and the “small-scale semi-commercial farming system”, practised by about 10% of the households. Of the i nterviewed households, 13 belonged to the “semi-commercial” group and 10 to the “subsistence” group. Production from fish ponds is low, in most cases within the range of 3–6 kg/are annually. Semi-commercial farmers produce more fish than subsistence farmers; motivated by their higher returns, they expand farms more often, using their own means. New ponds, however, are smaller and have a shorter life-span than the ponds built by subsidies provided by externally funded projects in the 1980s. P onds are inadequately fertilized. The main reason is scarcity of manure. The available manure is applied mainly during the cold dry season, both to fish ponds and vegetable gardens, not during the warm rainy season when the fish grows. Seasonal shortage of labour to collect and apply manure is one reason. Semi-commercial farmers have better manured ponds than subsistence farmers, the most apparent reason being their more numerous farm animals (cattle, goats and chickens).
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    Socio-economic study of fishing communities along Lake Mweru, Luapula province, Zambia 1994
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    Fish farmers in rural communities:: Results of a Survey in Northwestern Province of Zambia
    Results of a survey in northwestern province of Zambia
    1992
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    At the request of the Government of Zambia (GOZ), ALCOM surveyed farmers with fish ponds in the North Western Province during the second quarter of 1988. The objectives of the survey were: to determine the current status and future prospects of tilapia pond culture. to examine the characteristics of subsistence fish farmers, and constraints faced by them. The survey was carried out by staff from the Department of Fisheries and ALCOM, assisted by investigators and interpreters recruited for the survey. About 10% of the Province's known 1372 subsistence fish farmers were interviewed. The survey indicated that subsistence farmers harvested about 50 tons of tilapia during 1988. This was equivalent to about 6.6 kg per individual in the concerned households. The average physical productivity of the earthen gravity-fed ponds was low; about 4 kg per 100m2 per year. It is estimated that just below 20% of the production was taken out though intermittent harvesting (hook and line), the re st in major harvests, one or two per year. Ponds were seldom if ever drained. Some fish were left behind to reproduce. The tilapia farmed by subsistence farmers was expected to register production increases of about 5% per year, if existing ponds were kept in workable condition. This increase would come about through a rise in the total pond surface area, as an increase in physical productivity of ponds was not likely in the immediate future. The average subsistence fish farmer is better edu cated, more influential, and likely to be economically better off than the average head of a farming household in the Province. A comparison between farmers who have been introduced to tilapia culture through a recent aid project (ICARA) and other farmers, shows that prior to the ICARA project the characteristics described above for a fish farmer were even more pronounced.
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