Ban on hybrid shrimp keeps BD from higher forex income

Badrul Ahsan The government's apathy to allow cultivation of hybrid white shrimp and lack of modern technology are depriving the country of earnings over US$2.0 billion in exports a year, industry insiders said. The government in mid- 90s had imposed a ban on cultivation of this species of shrimp in the country for its white spot syndrome virus (WSSV), which spread many countries in the world. According to the Bangladesh Frozen Food Exporters Association (BFFEA), countries like India, Thailand, China, Vietnam, Taiwan, the Philippines and Indonesia have increased shrimp production through cultivating white shrimp, thus raising their forex earnings. The association said that the countries which cultivate white shrimps can produce more than 1000 kilo gramme (kg) on per hectare of land, whereas production of the traditional shrimp (Bagdha) in Bangladesh is around 200 kg per hectare only. Bangladesh earned around US $300 million through export of shrimp whereas India earned over US $1.0 billion, Vietnam US $ 1.2 billion and even Thailand earned about three times more than that of Bangladesh during the fiscal year 2010-11, BFFEA sources informed. Bangladesh has over 1,50,000 hectares of shrimp cultivable land which is more than that of India and three times higher than Thailand, BFFEA statistics showed. President of BFFEA, Kazi Shanewaz, told the FE recently that despite repeated requests to the government to lift the ban on farming white shrimp, they did not yet get any positive response in this regard. "We have repeatedly requested the government to lift the ban as the white spot syndrome virus is not found anywhere in the world now. But our authorities do not pay heed to our request," Mr Shanewaz said. The association chief also said that though they have got enough orders, they have been refusing letters of credits (LCs) regularly due to supply side constraints "Only cultivation of hybrid shrimps could enable the country to earn over 2 billion of US dollars within a couple of years," he added. Executive Director of BFFEA, Md Abul Bashar, said that the country would be able to boost foreign currency earnings significantly within a couple of years if the government allowed cultivation of hybrid shrimp. Mr Bashar also urged the government to provide the sector with modern technologies so that the cultivators could ensure proper water supply to their projects. He called for quality feed supply and establishment of modern processing centre for their produces. Driven by shrimp, Export Promotion Bureau (EPB) data showed that the country's frozen food export registered a 40 per cent growth to US$ 625 million in the last fiscal year (2010-11) from $ 437 million in the 2009-10 fiscal.