Agriculture Business Week

The farming of seaweeds is a major industry in the Philippines that provides livelihood and income to thousands of coastal families. In 2006, the Philippines, the top carrageenan producer in the world produced 1,338,597 metric tons of seaweeds, mainly red seaweeds that yield carageenan, a hydrocolloid used in the manufacture of many pharmaceutical, industrial and food products here and abroad.

In recent years, there has been a decline in the productivity of red seaweeds in the Sulu Sea where the bulk of the production comes from. The drop is attributed to many factors such as genetic deterioration (slow growth), lack of nutrients, and adverse environmental conditions.

The application of chemical fertilizers such as ammonium nitrate and ammonium sulfate is practiced in China and Japan for seaweed culture in coastal waters. In the Philippines, seaweed farmers do not apply fertilizer. No studies on the use of fertilizers for increasing growth of seaweeds in coastal waters have been reported yet.

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Posted on October 22nd, 2008 under Aquaculture. Tags: Seaweed. Comments: None

The 2007 Aquatic Technology Competition yielded a rich harvest of technologies that could be commercialized. The competition, which is in its third year, is a brainchild of Dr Rafael D. Guerrero III and his colleagues at the Philippine Council for Aquatic and Marine Research and Development. It is being implemented under the auspices of the National Aquatic Resources Research and Development Systems.

A team of young engineers garnered the top prize of P150,000 cash for their underwater robot. The robot called Angel One was developed by Roboteknik headed by Michael Poblete, a youthful mechanical engineering graduate of Mapua Institute of Technology. He describes Angel One as an underwater robot with a video camera and propulsion system. Its primary function is to conduct visual inspection of underwater objects and structures.

In aquaculture, the robot can be used to monitor the fish inside the fishpen, their rate of growth using optional scaling lasers, and feed consumption by measuring the amount of falling feed in the bottom of the fishpen. It could be used to spot holes or breaks in the net where high-value fish could escape.

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Posted on October 20th, 2008 under Aquaculture, Technology. Tags: Bangus, Disease, Seaweed, Tilapia. Comments: None

Hispanagar S.A. of Burgos, Spain, one of the world’s leading manufacturers of hydrocolloids, has, expressed interest in buying raw seaweed from the Philippines, mainly from Sitangkai, Tawi-tawi.

Jerry E. Pacturan, executive director of the Philippine Development Assistance Programme (PDAP) which is helping seaweed farmers in Sitangkai, has met with Hispanagar general manager Javier Fernandez and purchasing manager German Gonzalez in Spain who said that they would source seaweed from the country because of its high quality.

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Posted on September 29th, 2008 under Aquaculture. Tags: Seaweed. Comments: None

The Development Bank of the Philippines has recently extended an initial P5 million revolving credit line to Sitangkai-based exporter Sitexports to boost its working capital and increase trade with seaweed importers from France in behalf of the seaweed farmers of Sitangkai, Tawi-Tawi.

Sitangkai is the single biggest source of seaweeds in the country, accounting for half of the country’s total production.

Sitexports is bullish on growth prospects of the industry considering the growing demand for seaweed in the world market.

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Posted on August 8th, 2008 under Aquaculture. Tags: Seaweed. Comments: None