Difficulties
In recent years, lobster farming in Phu Yen has faced many difficulties and challenges. One of the major reasons was the high profit from lobster farming. Hence, people increased the number of cages spontaneously with high density, so increasing waste from uneaten feed to the environment. It led the farming area overloaded, and polluted environment, the disease on shrimp was getting worse.
Phu Yen province has around a total number of 27,000 lobsters farming cages in 2018. The situation of spontaneous lobster farming activity still happened. Local authorities have not implemented yet the detailed planning of farming areas. Moreover, the authority’s management of lobster cages farming such as number of cages, density, fingerlings and environment is still weak.
Solutions
In order to overcome the remaining difficulties, the People's Committee of Phu Yen Province has proposed to have a detail plan of farming areas. Currently, provincial general aquaculture area plan has been completed by the People's Committee and is being carried out step by step, in which detail plan of each farming area and area of water surface for households is established to create conducive conditions for farmers having stable production.
In addition to that, local lobster farmers in Phu Yen province should find more solutions for lobster farming in the sea. In line with that, it is necessary to take into account the market linkages in order to increase the values. Organizations linking farmers and enterprises need to be established, too.
Besides the macro solutions from the Government, some lobster farmers have been studied and applied advances of science and technology as a positive solution to increase survival rate, reduce the disease and increase productivity.
Lobster farmers acquire some experience through the process of lobster farming, such as: Farming areas should be placed in the lagoons, bays or pits with depth of above 6 meter, away from waste water from industrial, agricultural, and medical activities; using local fingerlings to save transportation cost and lobster will not be shocked while having high adaptation to local environmental conditions. Having well management practices while culturing, shrimp health condition should be monitored regularly for early diagnosis and timely treatment in accordance with the instructions of the specialized staff, increasing supplementation of vitamins and minerals for shrimp, cleaning of cages regularly, keeping track of the environmental factors to reduce the impact of weather changes, etc. Farmer’s responsibility for environmental protection should be encouraged and standardized. These factors can contribute to the productivity and sustainability of lobster farming.
Furthermore, many lobster farming models have been implemented by the Phu Yen Agricultural Extension Center. Towards the end of 2017, Phu Yen Agricultural Extension Center has implemented a model of lobster farming integrated with green mussel and seaweed to improve the environmental condition in Xuan Phuong commune, Song Cau towns, which was recommended by the Research Institute for Aquaculture No.3.
Therefore, the model initially has shown significant changes in lobster as it grew and developed well, and the water environment was significantly improved. Especially, on top of the incomes from lobster, farmers also have income from green mussel and seaweed.
Mai Le