India’s Marine Products Export Development Authority (MPEDA) has imposed a moratorium on the registration of new fishmeal and fish oil production units with effect from 1 January, 2020.
MPEDA said the decision was made in order to curb overexploitation of the country’s marine resources, The Hindu Business Line reported on 22 October. The moratorium extends to a ban on enhancement of production capacity by existing fishmeal units.
Fishmeal and fish oil are the major ingredients for aquatic feed manufacturing and aquaculture utilizes about 45 percent of global fishmeal production. Shrimp aquaculture is a major industry in India, with the country producing around 600,000 metric tons of farmed shrimp in 2018. Senior MPEDA officials said a boom in vannamei shrimp production in the past decade has resulted in rising demand for aquaculture feed mills.
However, overuse of wild-caught marine resources for fishmeal and fish oil production has become a major concern in India, especially the use of juvenile fish. The practice has been tied to stagnating catches of commercially important species and is putting India’s marine ecosystems at risk, MPEDA Chairman KS Srinivas told the Business Line.
“Hence, it has become the need of the hour to take effective measures towards sustainable development of fisheries and to curtail activities that directly or indirectly promote overexploitation of marine fishery resources,” Srinivas said.
India’s Meal Producers Association National Secretary Dawood Sait agreed the moratorium will help encourage more sustainable fishing practices and curb juvenile fishing.
There are more than 55 fishmeal industrial units in India’s Kerala, Maharashtra, Karnataka, and Tamil Nadu states. The units collectively produce about 250,000 metric tons of products annually and generate an annual turnover of USD 2.47 billion (EUR 2.22 billion), USD 918.6 million (EUR 825.9 million) of which comes from exports, according to the article.
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