Malawian Aquaculture Initiative Gives Cause for Quiet Hope

GRAHAMSTOWN, May 31 (IPS) - From time immemorial, fishermen on Lake Malawi have depended on the chambo to help feed their families -- all without upsetting the stocks of this fish species. Following the start of commercial fishing on the lake, however, the annual catch of chambo plunged, from 3,250 tonnes in 1985 to 207 tonnes in 2002.

Government was eventually forced to put a stop to the commercial operations.

The Maldeco Aquaculture company was established in 2003 to build up chambo stocks through aquaculture -- and Tom Shipton of Enviro-Fish Africa (a consulting firm based in Grahamstown, South Africa) hired as a technical advisor to the project. He recently chatted to IPS reporter Steven Lang.

IPS: Why did the Malawians turn to you for advice?

TOM SHIPTON: Initially they hired a European consultancy to come down and do the assessments and so forth. It was a big project and they were planning on building 12 or 16 of these 12 metre cages, 10 metres deep. It’s similar to the salmon farms, using salmon cage technology; but they soon realised that their plans were not working.

IPS: And that’s where you came in?

TS: Yes. They went to the Development Bank of Southern Africa (DBSA) for a large loan to do some more research and I went up there to look at the technical side.

Essentially what they had done is, they had taken the technology for Oreochromis niloticus (the Nile tilapia) and had assumed that it was the same for this new species (the chambo, for which the scientific name is Oreochromis karongae).

They are both Oreochromis, but they are very different species. The Oreochromis karongae, which is the one they are using here, has a very different kind of breeding behaviour and so forth.

So, we were worried that if we used the model for the Oreochromis niloticus it might not work here.

IPS: What were the potentially critical differences?

TS: At that time, we didn’t know what the fecundity was, what was the survival rate...They didn’t even know the growth rates, and if you don’t know the growth rates you can’t do a production schedule -- so how do you plan your financials? There were a lot of biotechnical issues that needed to be resolved.

IPS: How did you go about addressing these issues?

TS: The DBSA then put in half a million rand (about 65,000 dollars) of research money and we sent somebody up there, Dr Jerome Davis, for a nine month period just doing experiments: getting the various growth rates and looking at another species as well -- the shiranus (Oreochromis shiranus) -- and really just getting to the fundamental biology, looking at what kind of sex ratios you needed in your ponds, those kind of things.

IPS: What were the outcomes of this research?

TS: What essentially did come out of it is that the karongae grows a lot slower than the niloticus, probably about a third slower -- I’m not sure exactly. But, it really was quite significant.

They found that the shiranus, the other species that just got into the cages, actually grows a lot faster. But with the shiranus you get the males growing very fast and the females going into this precocious breeding...When you crowd them up, then the females feel stressed and they naturally go into this reproductive cycle where they start breeding at a very small size...So, you end up with thousands of small fish instead of the big fish which is the high value species.

This is a common problem with most Oreochromus, but the karongae is a late developer -- which allows both sexes to grow larger. This means that you don’t have to have single sex populations.

IPS: Why is it better to have fewer large fish rather than many smaller fish?

TS: Well, here in South Africa or in Europe it is a big problem because people like eating the larger fish, but up in Malawi it is not really such a big issue because the people eat small fish.

You’re wasting a lot of energy, because you’re putting a lot of energy in for reproduction, but what you really want to do is be getting into the growth of body mass.

IPS: The project has been underway for just on five years now. Is it achieving its goals?

TS: They’re not up to full production; they’re not up to 3,000 tonnes yet, not anywhere near it. But, Malawi is a difficult country to get things going in.

One of the problems was that if you produce 3,000 tonnes per annum and you have a food conversion ratio of let’s say 1.5, that means you need four-and-a-half thousand tonnes of fish feed every year.

Now, you’re on the south-east arm of Lake Malawi, the roads very often get washed away during storms, then the aid agencies come along and they put down roads, but they’re not good quality roads -- so they last a couple of seasons, then they break up.

IPS: And the feed has to come from outside?

TS: Well, they’re looking at producing their own soya and their own basics, but at the moment most of it is.

That’s a major constraint. The other constraint is human resources. You’ve got a very high turnover of people as well: there are very few people in Malawi who have got the educational level to actually operate hatchery systems and be great admin managers.

And sadly the other reality is that HIV is a major problem up there. You train them up and then they die.

IPS: What are your feelings about the long term prospects of this project?

TS: It is difficult, but the fact of the matter is that they have managed to put this farm together and it is functional. I am quietly hopeful. They might not get up to their 3,000 tonnes, but they’ve been there for five years, and they’ve learnt a lot of lessons. It’s coming on.

Malawi crush Djibouti

Malawi's new coach Kinnah Phiri led his side to an 8-1 thrashing of visiting Djibouti in Group 12 of the 2010 World Cup and Africa Cup of Nations on Saturday.

Elvis Kafoteka began the rout with a goal after just four minutes, Esau Kanyenda then made it 2-0 in the 20th minute.

Djibouti pulled one back three minutes later with a goal from Daya Hassan.

But Kayenda then completed his hat-trick with two goals in the first five minutes of the second half.

Joseph Kamwendo, Moses Chavula, Robert Ngambi and Noel Mkandawire all then found the target to wrap up the victory.

Phiri only took over as coach of Malawi ten days ago replacing Englishman Stephen Constantine.

Next weekend Malawi travel to play the DR Congo while Djibouti have the daunting task of hosting the African Champions, Egypt.

The other Group 12 game is on Sunday in Cairo between Egypt and the DR Congo.

Malawi's former president freed on bail

Former Malawi President Bakili Muluzi was released on bail on Friday, six days after being detained on suspicion of involvement in a coup plot and placed under house arrest.

A High Court judge in the commercial capital Blantyre ordered Muluzi be released on bail of 200,000 kwacha ($1,500) and that he should report to police once a month.

Muluzi, the opposition United Democratic Front's candidate in the 2009 presidential election, has been held under house arrest since Sunday when he was taken into custody. Police have raided his home and interrogated him.

He was arrested on suspicion of being involved in a plot to overthrow the government.

Defence lawyers had asked the court to declare the arrest unlawful because the state failed to charge the former leader within the 48 hour rule.

Five members of Muluzi's UDF and three army generals were arrested last week on suspicion of being part of a plot to oust President Bingu wa Mutharika and put Muluzi into power. They have been released on bail.

The arrests have prompted protests by UDF supporters who have clashed with police. One person has been killed and scores arrested.

Muluzi remains popular in the impoverished southern African nation for ending the rule of long time strongman Hastings Kamuzu Banda in 1994 and paving the way for democracy. He held power until 2004 when he was replaced by wa Mutharika.

But the two have fallen out over the president's anti-corruption drive, which has targeted some UDF members, including Muluzi. Wa Mutharika quit the UDF to form the Democratic Progressive Party, taking with him many UDF MPs.

The opposition objected to the floor crossing and is trying to have the president impeached. It also is threatening to block passage of the country's budget.

Success in reducing HIV rate

LILONGWE, 30 May 2008 (PlusNews) - When Pastor Gilbert Momola told the audience at Civo Stadium in Malawi’s capital, Lilongwe, that he was HIV positive, he touched the hearts of many, including that of retired Zambian president Kenneth Kaunda.

“Such openness is one of the tools with which to reduce the prevalence rate among our people,” said Kaunda, who has been an icon in the fight against the pandemic since the death of his 30-year-old son from an AIDS-related illness.

“When my son died of AIDS in 1986, we made it a point as a family to tell the world that AIDS is real, and that there was a need to speak openly about it if we were to save lives,” he told the audience at the Annual International AIDS Candlelight Memorial Day on 18 May.

Mary Shawa, Malawi’s secretary for HIV/AIDS and nutrition in the Office of the President and Cabinet (OPC), announced recently that Malawi's HIV prevalence rate had dropped to 12 percent in 2007, from 14.4 percent in 2004.

“We have moved from a society where there was a lot of stigma and discrimination to one that is accepting those that are living with HIV and AIDS, and for a reverend to talk about his sero-status so openly means that we have made a breakthrough,” Shawa told IRIN/PlusNews.

Apart from greater openness, she attributed Malawi's success in reducing its HIV prevalence to higher levels of testing and successful education campaigns. Civil society groups have also played a significant role by speaking openly about AIDS, and the importance of faithfulness and being tested, and talking about treatment to groups at schools, churches and public places.

Against the odds

Despite a dire shortage of health care workers, Malawi has also managed to increase the number of people on life-prolonging antiretroviral (ARV) drugs from around 70,000 in 2006 to 150,000 in 2008.

The National AIDS Commission (NAC) aims to have all 240,000 Malawians in need of ARVs on treatment by 2010, in line with the UN Millennium Development Goal of universal treatment access.

Shawa pointed out that another important area to which Malawi has managed to channel scarce resources was improved nutrition for people living with HIV.
“In Malawi, the pandemic is basically intertwined with nutrition and we tell people that taking ARVs without nutritious food does not help much.”

A government programme distributes food parcels containing cooking oil, beans, groundnuts and flour to malnourished people living with HIV.

Challenges remain

Justice Anastazia Msosa, chairperson of the Malawi Network of People Living with HIV and AIDS (MANET+), said one of the biggest challenges to Malawi's anti-AIDS efforts was inadequate human resources in the health care sector.

International donors and government have poured millions of dollars into the AIDS programme, but efforts to increase access to HIV testing, care and treatment have been hindered by the movement of health workers to Europe and other parts of the world. Although the country trains close to 80 nurses a year, analysts estimate that around 100 others leave annually.

Malawi has appealed to Britain not to employ its nurses and doctors, but efforts to completely halt the exodus are yet to start paying dividends. Dorothy Ngoma, president of the Nurses and Midwives Association of Malawi, said nurses were leaving in search of higher pay. “There is also a need to improve working conditions for nurses if they are to remain in Malawi.”

It is estimated that 64 percent of nursing posts, and 33 percent of all health care posts, are vacant. The number of doctors working in the public health sector is one-sixth of that recommended by the World Health Organisation.