High efficiency
“After nearly 4 months of farming, sea cucumber and spotted Babylon snail develop well, survival rate is over 85%. This indicates that spotted Babylon snail and sea cucumbers are suitable for natural conditions in the coastal areas of Mo Duc district”, said technical staff of Agriculture extension Center of Mo Duc commune, Mr. Tran Dinh Hung.
Taking advantage of the facilities of on – sand shrimp ponds, in early June 2018, Mo Duc Agriculture Extension Center carried out cleaning of lakes and water treatment, raising 2,500 sea cucumbers (100 units / kg) and 1kg of spotted Babylon snails (32 thousand heads / kg) in an area of 0.4ha of water surface. Up to now, the weight of snail is 230 heads / kg, sea cucumber reaches 5-6 units / kg.
According to the Research Institute for Aquaculture No.3 (Nha Trang), this result is very positive and impressive as some coastal areas of Binh Son and Duc Pho communes have been raised for sea cucumbers, however, the survival rate is low, growing slowly. At the price of VND 200,000-280,000 / kg, according to calculations, profit from the model of raising sea cucumbers and snails can bring over VND 500 million / ha / crop.
Scaling up
Considered as the “capital” of on – sand shrimp farming, but in recent years, the coastal area of Mo Duc is quiet because of disease. Therefore, the success of this model promises to help this coastal area restore aquaculture.
“Not only solving economic problems, sea cucumber will also be the object of solving the problem of environmental pollution caused by aquaculture in the coastal area. Thus, in parallel with the transfer of technology and replication of mono – culture of sea cucumber or combined with spotted Babylon snail culture, the district will assist farmers in finding businesses, contracting products”, said Vice – Chairman of People's Committee of Mo Duc commune, Mr. Vu Nhan stated.
The technique of raising sea cucumbers is simple, but because this species is quite “sensitive” to the environment, thus, if the selection, recovery and treatment of environment is not guaranteed, it will greatly affect the efficiency. Moreover, from the lesson learned from on - sand shrimp farming, it must be carefully pay attention on the issue of product output and environmental impact.
However, according to Department of Agriculture and Rural Development of Khanh Hoa province, the food of sea cucumber is plankton, organic humus, waste of snail, so sea cucumber is considered as “sanitary plant of the pond”. Therefore, the development of sea cucumbers in coastal areas not only diversifies the objects, methods and technology of culturing, raising the economic efficiency, increasing income for the people, but also contributes to the protection of the environment and fisheries resources development.
Huong Tra
Source: thuysanvietnam.com