The pen culture fish farming has brought fortune to 15,000 poor people in five districts of greater Faridpur as the Tk8 lakh project has produced fish worth at Tk45 lakh.
In fiscal year of 2009-2010, a pen culture exhibition was held under the district fisheries development project, which saw the inclusion of land owners and local people. The beneficiaries made a big profit the first year, which resulted in the expansion of pen culture in five districts.
The marshes in Gopalganj, Madaripur, Faridpur, Shariatpur and Rajbari go under three to 10 feet of water during the monsoon. Rice cannot be grown in most of the marshes as it becomes unsuitable for rice production. The problem led to the beginning of social fish farming, also known as pen culture, where land owners and the impoverished people teamed up.
Under the project, marshes are enclosed with nets before carp fries are released. These fries grow along with natural fishes but are not required to be fed externally except aquatic plants. All the expenses are paid by the government fund.
The fish are netted and sold in November and the profit is equally distributed among the beneficiaries. The amount taken from the government fund is deposited in a bank to arrange fish farming the following year.
Project sources say from the fiscal year 2009-2010 to the present, 21,775 tonnes of fish were produced in 76 pen cultures in Gopalganj, 4,650 tonnes in 26 pen cultures in Madaripur, 5,210 tonnes in 24 pen cultures in Faridpur, 1,330 tonnes in 22 pen cultures in Rajbari, and 190 tonnes in three pen cultures in Shariatpur. The produce benefitted 5,000 land owners and 10,000 impoverished people.
Tk8,10,740 was spent in the farming in 3,000 hectares of land in five districts while the fish produce was worth Tk45 crore.
Kotalipara upazila Chairman Mujibur Rahman Howladar, who benefitted from pen culture, said the project was initiated with the financial and technical assistance as well as training from the Fisheries Department.
“We made a huge sum of money in profit in the first year. As we learned the ins and outs of pen culture, we now implement such projects socially without project assistance,” he said.
The chairman said the poor work really hard to implement pen culture projects.
“Each of the beneficiaries made a profit of at least Tk15,000. They easily accepted the project and are now reaping the rewards,” added Mujibur.
Nondo Lal Biswas, a land owner in Gopalpur under Tungipara upazila, said: “During the rainy season, the lands become inundated and we cannot grow anything then. That is when we initiate the pen culture project which really turned out to be very profitable.”
Khokon Bala, an ultra-poor man in Shuagram, said he supplies aquatic moss in pen culture projects in the rainy season, a period when he usually remains unemployed.
“The effort is small on my part but I get the amount that the initiators get,” he said.
Kotalipara Upazila Fisheries Officer Prashanta Kumar Sarkar said the government has created employment through the pen culture project.
“We provided them with hands-on training, financial assistance and suggestions, and they used it to make big profits,” he said.
“As they are now implementing similar projects on their own, we can say the project has succeeded,” he added.
Director of the greater Faridpur fisheries development project Dr Abdul Quadir said the government, after assuming power in 2009, undertook fisheries development project in five districts at a cost of Tk784.89 crore.
“Two to 2.5 tonnes of fish can be produced in each hectare of land. Besides, the project helped grow the production of fish through a number of other initiatives,” he added.
