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 Aquaculture America
2003 - Meeting Abstract
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309
Economic effect of stocker catfish
(Ictalurus
punctatus) production on
farm profitability. |
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Steeve
Pomerleau* and Carole Engle
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Traditionally, farmers understock 9-27 g fingerlings
directly into growout ponds in multiple-batch production.
However, some use a three-phase strategy, where fingerlings
are raised to stocker-size (27-340 g) in single-batch for one
growing season, before transfer to growout ponds. Does the use
of stockers improve farm productivity and profitability? A
series of pond studies were conducted at the University of
Arkansas at Pine Bluff on fingerling and stocker production
and performance in growout ponds. Enterprise budgets were
developed based on three sizes of farm (65, 130, and 260-ha)
and eight production strategies. Five strategies involved the
production of stockers (114, 135, 176, 255, and 361-g)
thereafter stocked in growout ponds at 11,250/ha, in
single-batch production. The three other strategies involved
understocking fingerlings (6, 12, and 37-g) directly into
growout ponds at 15,000/ha with 1,369 kg/ha of large 580-g
catfish to simulate multiple-batch production.
Results indicated two principal
profit-maximizing strategies (Table 1). One strategy was to
understock 37-g fingerlings in multiple-batch growout ponds.
The other was to produce 255-g stockers before transfer to
growout ponds. Three main factors affected the relative
profitability of the 255-g stocker versus the 37-g fingerling
strategy. As farm size increased (Table 1) or pond size
decreased, the stocker strategy became more profitable than
the fingerling strategy because it used resources more
efficiently. The stocker strategy was not as profitable for
small farms or for larger ponds because it was more difficult
to balance the number of stockers produced with the number
stocked in growout ponds, resulting in wasted resources. The
third factor was the growth rate of the stockers in growout
ponds. As the growth rate of the stockers increased, the
relative profitability of the stocker strategy increased.
This static analysis indicated the profit-maximizing
strategy for a single year. However, the analysis did not
consider the effect of each strategy on farm profitability
over multiple years, the increased risk of mortalities and
off-flavor, nor the logistics of producing and stocking
successive batches of stockers throughout the season across
the whole farm. Additional research is needed in a dynamic
framework to evaluate the effects of these additional factors.
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