The Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries will next year be embarking on a campaign aimed at increasing the production and consumption of tilapia as part of measures to grow the aquaculture industry.

Making the disclosure after a tour of the Longville Park Farms in Clarendon on Monday (December 28), Agriculture Minister Floyd Green said enormous opportunities exist for local tilapia, one of the subsectors that have seen growth despite the challenges brought on by the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.

“We are going to be doing a massive promotional drive for consumption and to dispel the myths, because the myths not only affect consumption, they affect people going into the industry. We want more people to go into the industry to fill the demand and to tap into the export market,” Green argued.

“We are seeing a 50 per cent to 100 per cent increase in demand for the fish,” he said, adding that the ministry’s hatchery would be expanded to meet the growing needs of the sector.

The minister lauded the operators of Longville Park Farms for their use of technology in the production of tilapia in order to make the facility profitable and sustainable.

Donovan ‘Donnie’ Bunting, owner of Longville Park Farms, said the aquaculture industry was a source of employment for many Jamaicans.

Bunting added that farming tilapia is “economically sustainable” and that the fish can be grown on a totally vegetarian diet.

He said he wanted to see a thriving tilapia sector that “employs hardworking Jamaicans and produces a sustainable, healthy, environmentally friendly, locally produced protein”.

Said Bunting: “I am willing to share the extensive knowledge and data that I have amassed to fellow farmers and agriculture researchers.”

JIS