Environmental Sustainability Of Shrimp Farming In Malaysia Economics Essay

The world shrimp production has rapidly expanded over the last decades. The expansion is mainly attributed to technological breakthrough from innovation (Ling, Leung, & Shang, 1999; Shang, Leung, & Ling, 1998) and vast consumption in the global market (Oosterveer, 2006; Shang, et al., 1998). The introduction of new production technologies such as antibiotics, antimicrobial and gene transformation are able to prevent infection of diseases and reduce mortality rate. Advanced production technologies also lowers the operating costs and increases the profits of shrimp producers. However, extensive usage of antibiotics in shrimp production has raised health concerns and has resulted in the banning of imported shrimps by major European importers. Imported shrimps from China has been banned by European Council (EC) in 2002 due to the over presence of antibiotics in the products. Another issue of advanced aquaculture technology is the introduction of new species into the wild population. For instance, gene transformation creates new species of shrimp for commercial purposes but if the new species escapes into the wild population, it could be predator for certain sea creatures and destroy the ecosystem balance (Deb, 1998).

Large global demand on shrimp is mainly due to high consumption in developed countries such as…. (Describe the statistics). The increase in demand in these economy is not only due to satisfy material needs but also to related to the consumption trend in that social, culture, and political term. For instance, Japanese consumption of high quantity of seafood in daily life is one of the Japanese cultures, and policies of European Union encourage the consumer to consume high quality seafood. Moreover, in the study of (Uddin, 2009) has been mentioned about once shrimp was considered as luxury foodstuff by many people.

Hence, high demand in the international provides job opportunities to the people in developing countries; and due to the currency exchange rate, exporting the local products to developed countries would bring the producer higher revenue. From these points we could explain the perception of people in Bangladesh take shrimp production activity as a tendency of quick money-making as mentioned in (Deb, 1998). This statement supported by (Ali, 2006), the author outlined that Bangladesh shrimp export revenue has grown from US$4.0 million to US$360 million, the net profit from this activity is 12 times than that of high yielding variety rice. Henceforth, they dramatically shift their production from rice paddy to shrimp farming in order to obtain the opportunity of gaining higher revenue.

China is the biggest shrimp producer since 1988 until 1992 and contributed about a million metric ton of the world shrimp production in 2000 (Biao & Kaijin, 2007). The recent biggest shrimp producing nation is Thailand. Since 1991, Thailand has taken over China in world shrimp production, becoming leading producer and exporter by exporting up to 90% of his production (Huitric, Folke, & Kautsky, 2002; Shang, et al., 1998). The other major shrimp producing countries are Indonesia, India, Bangladesh, and Ecuador by producing between 300,000 to 400,000 tons metric each (World Shrimp Market, 2004). Henceforth, those four major shrimp producing countries contributed more than 50 per cent of total world shrimp supply; in other words, Asia has competitive advantage in producing shrimp and competes in global market.

Overview of Asia Shrimp Production

Asia is the world’s most populous and largest continent; consist of 31,880,000 km2 and with approximately four billion people or sixty per cent of world human population. (More information)

Asia is the major contributor in world shrimp market. In 1990s, Asia produced approximately 78% of world shrimp and the rest (22%) were produced by western countries(Shang, Leung et al. 1998; Ling, Leung et al. 1999). Asian cultured shrimp production mainly produces Penaeus Monodon, followed by Penaues Vannamei, to international market (Shang, Leung et al. 1998). Thailand is a leading producer and exporter; other major shrimp producing countries are China, Vietnam, India, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Taiwan, Sri Lanka, the Philippines, and Malaysia. Besides that, Japan is the world second largest in shrimp consumption. (Data of Japan shrimp C)

The improvement of hatchery operation have reduced the price of hatchery-produced shrimp fry to competitive level is one of the main reasons of rapid expansion of shrimp production in Asia (Shang, Leung et al. 1998); whereas, with lower cost of fry, labor cost, and land (input), the shrimp producers are able to produce shrimp (output) to global market with lower prices. Now a day, the producer widely relies on the seed stock from shrimp hatcheries instead of wild seed stock is because of wild fry have proven limited and unreliable in supporting a rapidly expanding shrimp industry.

Reference:

Ling, B.-H., P. S. Leung, et al. (1999). “Comparing Asian shrimp farming: the domestic resource cost approach.” Aquaculture 175(1-2): 31-48.

Shang, Y. C., P. Leung, et al. (1998). “Comparative economics of shrimp farming in Asia.” Aquaculture 164(1-4): 183-200.

United Nation, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Statistics Division, 2008. Statistical Yearbook. New York 52

Fisheries

Marine and Aquaculture.

Percentage of marine and percentage of aquaculture production.

Methods used for aquaculture.

Work forces involved.

An Overview of Malaysian Shrimp Production [1] 

The fisheries sector which included of marine capture fisheries and aquaculture produced approximately 1,650,000 tones of food fish worth RM6, 460 million in 2007. This sector recorded an increase in production by 4.17% and value by 3.65% as compared to the year 2006. Besides that, the fisheries sector contributed 1.2% to the GDP or worth RM6, 298 million. The majority fish production is produced from marine capture fisheries, contributing 83.51% to the total national fish production with a value of approximately five thousand million Riggit Malaysia; while the aquaculture sub-sector only contributing 16.23% of the total fish production with a value of RM1, 393 million [2] . However, aquaculture showed an increase in production by 26.64% and in value by 7.87% as compared to the year 2006. For the year of 2007, fisheries sector provided 120,904 work forces, where 21,287 of the work forces are fish culturists were involved in various aquaculture systems.

Most of the freshwater aquaculture production was contributed from pond culture system, about 70% of total freshwater aquaculture products; while on-bottom culture system was main contributor for brackish water aquaculture, about 25% of total brackish water aquaculture production. Other freshwater culture systems are ex-mining pools system, cage culture system, cement tank system, pen culture system, and canvas; while other brackish water culture systems are including pond, cage, on-bottom, rank, and tank culture system. Furthermore, the top producer by using pond culture method is Perak state compared with other states with 11,427 tones worth RM131.41 million; the total pond culture area increased from 5,623.69 hectares in 2006 to 7,627.11 hectares in 2007 (or 35.62% of growth rate), but this culture system production decreased 1.6 % in 2007. In addition, Perak state produced the most aquaculture product in year 2007 with grand total 70.05 tonnes compared to second largest producer, Selangor, with 24.9 tones [3] .

In the year 2007, production from the national aquaculture sub-sector was 268,514.21 tones worth at RM1, 393.35 million, contributed mainly by the production from brackish water aquaculture (73.91%) and the remained was contributed by freshwater aquaculture. Work force, however, was majority involved in freshwater sub-sector, which are 75.48% of the total fish culturists. Brackish water aquaculture provided only about 25% of work force over the total fish culturists; however, this culture system contributed 73.91% of the total aquaculture production with the growth rate of production was 31.97% and the value rose from RM 999.41 million in 2006 to RM1, 044 million in 2007 (or 4.45% of growth rate). Why brackish water aquaculture production can produce largest share of total aquaculture production with lesser labor input?

Penaus Merguiensis (banana shrimp) and Monodon (tiger shrimp) is widely and solely produced by using brackish water pond culture method with 23,737 and 11,435 tones, respectively. The major banana shrimp producer is Perak state, and then follows with Selangor and Johore state.