Shrimp production in Thailand is continuing to recover and could increase by 5 percent this year, according to Rittirong Boonmechote, president of Thai Union Group’s global shrimp business. Conversely, Robins McIntosh, senior vice-president of CP Group, believes that the sector has stalled, and that as such the country will produce a little over 300,000 metric tons (MT) this year, which is the same as in 2016.
The two differing evaluations of Thailand’s shrimp productivity were presented together at the Global Aquaculture Alliance (GAA) GOAL 2017 conference in Dublin, Ireland, by GAA President George Chamberlain.
McIntosh informed Chamberlain that the parasite enterocytozoon hepatopenaei (EHP) continues to be a problem and that too much infected material is still getting out of the hatcheries.
More work is needed on the carriers of EHP and improved diagnostics, he said.
However, greater efficiency in terms of the length of production cycles and size of harvests, have seen a “shrinkage” in the culture area – from 70,000 hectares of ponds in 2010 to 10,000 hectares today.
McIntosh said the shrimp industry needs new disruptive technology to overcome current bottlenecks and that he sees opportunities to now establish “bulletproof shrimp” by pumping up the animals’ immune systems to deal with more challenging culture conditions.
An alternative development would be to create intensified production systems that are much better controlled in terms of sanitation, health and biosecurity, he said.
GOAL delegates heard that global shrimp production is currently growing at a slow rate of 4.8 percent per year that will see it reach a total volume of around 5 million MT by 2019.
