3. SURVEY FINDINGS AND CONCLUSIONS

3.1 Socio-economic characteristics

Of all the homesteads surveyed, 89% are male-headed and 11% de jure female-headed. However, 21% of the male-headed homesteads have male heads who are not full-time residents. All three groups, pond owners, neighbours and non-neighbours, are closely similar in the percentage of male-headed homesteads.

The overall average number of adult residents contributing their labour on a full-time basis is 2.3. There is a slight difference between pond owners and the others in this respect, with the average for pond owners being 2.5, while that for neighbours is 2.3 and for non-neighbours 2.1.

Major differences between pond owners and the other groups manifest themselves in both the level of agricultural activity and the nature of economic activity. Ownership of cattle and chicken is higher among pond owners. The average number of cattle per pond owning homestead is 20, against 12 per homestead for neighbours and 7 for non-neighbours. The average numbers of chickens also favours pond owners. This group has an average of 26 chickens per homestead, against 19 for neighbours and 15 for non-neighbours.

A higher level of agricultural activity is also evident amongst pond owners from the information obtained about ownership of transport and implements. 39% of pond owners own either a tractor or pick-up, compared to only 18% of neighbours and 15% of non-neighbours. Conversely, only 17% of pond owners have neither a tractor or pick-up whereas as many as 42% of neighbours and 39% of non-neighbours are without these implements.

This picture is confirmed by the nature of economic activity of the different groups. Pond owners are decidedly more likely to be oriented in their agricultural activity towards the growing of crops for sale, the other groups more towards subsistence farming. When asked which crops --between cash and food crops---- were more important to them, 52% of pond owners mentioned cash crops, against only 26% of neighbours and 31% of non-neighbours. Similarly, when asked to state their main source of income between remittances, sale of crops, sale of livestock, handicrafts, hawking, off-farm employment and other forms of economic activity, 78% of pond owners indicated that their main sources of income were either sale of livestock or sale of crops. Only 44% of the neighbours and 52% of the non-neighbours mentioned these as their main sources of income.

69% of pond owners, 52% of neighbours and 48% of non-neighbours employ labour in their farming operations. In addition to further confirming the more agriculturally active nature of the pond owning group, this also suggests that there is no shortage of labour in the region. In fact, when asked what problems they experienced with labour, only four out of the 148 respondents cited shortage or difficulty in obtaining sufficient labour as a problem.

3.2 Farming systems

3.2.1 Meteorological information

The average annual rainfall in Lubombo District is around 600 mm, but there are strong fluctuations. Years with very low rainfall often occur in the lowveld.

The mean monthly water temperatures for the Nyetane Fish Farm are given in Table 1.

Table 1: Mean Monthly water temperatures at Nyetane Fish Farm

3.2.2 Farming

Information about the farming systems in Lubombo district was obtained from discussions with Mr. C. Pitts, Cropping System Programme, MoAC, and Mr. R. Reusen, Economist, Programme for planning and Monitoring of Small Scale Farmers Strategies MoAC, FAO. Information was also extracted from a socio-economic survey carried out by the latter programme.

Farms are small in Lubombo District. 70% of the homesteads cultivate less than one hectare of land (Table 2).

Table 2: Distribution of cultivated land by homesteads

The main food crop is maize. Hybrid maize is cultivated by most of the farmers (93%), local maize is cultivated by 30%. The maize production is on average above 2 tons/ha/yr, but varies with the farm size, whereby the smaller farms realize a lower productivity (Table 3).

The percentage of homesteads keeping animals and the average number of animals kept by one homestead are given in Table 4.

Table 3: Maize production by farm size

Table 4: Ownership of animals

Cattle manure from the kraal is used for fertilizing the gardens and the maize fields. In most cases not all the manure is being used, and there is manure for other purposes.

The average size of a homestead is 8.2 members. Table 5 gives the labour distribution of the homesteads' members between the ages of 15 and 64.

Table 5: Labour distribution of homestead members in %

The average labour availability for farm work is high, especially for homesteads cultivating a small area (Table 6).

Table 6: Labour availability in man-years

The labour availability of 12 man-years/hectare on the farms cultivating less than 0.5 hectare is high, indicating that labour does not have to limit the uptake of new activities. Also, the fact that 11% of the men and 7% of the women are job seekers, indicates that there may be scope for alternative income-generating activities.

3.3 Fish farming practices

In Swaziland five fish species are being cultured: Salmo gairdneri, Tilapia rendalli, Oreochromis mossambicus, Cyprinus carpio, and Clarias qariepinus.

The decision to construct a pond and start fish farming was taken by the head of the homestead in 28 cases, by the spouse in six cases, by the head and spouse jointly in one case and by the son of the head in six cases. Of the 46 pond owners, 23 have their ponds within sight of the home and 20 have them situated out of sight of the home. Responses for the remaining three were not obtained.

Thirty-one of the pond owners used pick and shovel to construct their pond, three used an ox-scraper and 11 used a mechanical grader.

In Lubombo Region, the average size of the 25 ponds whose areas were estimated during the survey was 412 m². The distribution of sizes is given in Table 7.

Table 7: Distribution of ponds by size

From this table it is clear that the majority of fish ponds is small in size. The ponds constructed with the sole purpose of culturing fish had an average size is 24 m² (n=10). 72% of the owners say that there is fish in their ponds. The average age of the fish is almost 2 years (Table 8).

Table 8: Age distribution of fish in fish ponds

As regards the management of the ponds, only five owners give it top priority within their operations. 31 give pond management second priority. Of the total, 12 ponds are reported by their owners to be not in working condition.

Most pond owners feed their fish with on-farm wastes (see Table 9), but it is unclear in which amounts. In 35 of the ponds, feeding is carried out once a week or more frequently and in 26 pond-owning homesteads, other animals are given the same feed as the fish.

Table 9. Use of Fish Feed Materials.

17 respondents answered that they fertilized the ponds, whereas 15 don't. The frequency varies: every month (4), every year (7), when needed (3), and others (3). Six owners use cattle manure, nine use chicken manure, one uses pig manure and two use chemical fertilisers.

The survey did not ask which fish species are found in ponds. Since most farmers received their fingerlings from the Fisheries Section, it is likely that carp (C. carpio) and tilapia (O. mossambicus) are cultured in either mono- or poly-culture in Lubombo Region.

Of the 52 pond owners, 21 said they had never harvested their ponds. 20 pond owners had harvested their ponds at least once, 12 by using a net, 4 by hook and line and 8 using other methods. 31 ponds can be drained but only 16 have ever been drained. It is not clear if drainage is practised for fish harvest. Those who harvested the fish do not practise it at regular intervals.

Use of the fish after harvesting is primarily for home consumption. Only one farmer sells his fish and only three both sell and consume.

The apparent level of interest in developing fish farming is high. Of the 102 neighbours and non-neighbours asked if they were interested, only 18 responded that they were not. Of the 12 owners of ponds reported not to be in working condition, only one said that he was not interested in having it rehabilitated.

Two fish farmers in Lubombo Region were revisited and their fish farming activities were discussed in detail.

Mrs. Zini Ndlovu's homestead had a pond of 50 m², which was stocked in 1990 with 50 carp fingerlings. The pond had been constructed for irrigation purposes. It was stocked when the fisheries extension worker brought too many fingerlings for the pond of another farmer. So far the pond had not been harvested. Mrs. Ndlovu said that she likes to eat fresh fish but rarely does so because of its unavailability. The size of fish is more important to her then the taste or the presence of bones. Fish smaller than 200 gr. is not acceptable. She wants to have more fish ponds and said that labour for pond construction does not pose any problem.

The homestead of Mrs. Maziya had constructed a pond which was stocked with carp. Because of water shortage the fish were harvested and another pond had been constructed. This pond, however, was never stocked since the Fisheries Section could not provide fingerlings becuase of lack of transport. Mrs. Maziya said that a pick and a shovel were used for pond construction and that the construction itself was no problem. She would like to have more ponds and fish which reproduces in the ponds. 150 gr. fish seemed to be an acceptable size.

3.4 Fish consumption and preferences

When asked “What kinds of relish does your family eat?”, meat, vegetables, potatoes, fish, beans, jugo beans, sour milk and cowpeas were the principal items cited. There is an indication that the less agriculturally active neighbours and non-neighbours are more likely to have a less varied diet than pond owners. 44% of neighbours and 50% of non-neighbours against 22% of pond owners cited only two types of relish - or even fewer.

When asked whether they normally have food to last until the next harvest, 26% of pond owners, 48% of neighbours and 37% of non-neighbours answered that they did not; almost all of them bought additional food supplies.

Only four of all the respondents answered “No” to the question “Does your family eat fish?” When asked “How often do you eat fish?”, a total of 55% of all respondents answered “Once a week” and 13% answered “Once every two weeks”. In 70% of all the homesteads, all members of the family eat fish and 81% obtain their fish solely by buying from shops with the remaining minority obtaining their supplies from both shops and either ponds, traders or neighbours.

Average spending by homesteads on one fish meal, based on respondents' estimates, was E3.2 as compared to E6.2 for one meat meal. When asked “What would you choose between fish and other meats?”, 43% of all respondents chose fish. There was no significant difference in the numbers preferring fish between the different categories of pond owner, neighbour and non-neighbour.

When asked “What different types of fish do you know?”, 50% of respondents cited four or more types; these included catfish, carp, eel, sardines and pilchards and tilapia. Which of these different types did they prefer? 24% said catfish was the most preferred, followed by sardines/pilchards, tilapia, carp and eel (see Table 10). Catfish is preferred based on the amount of meat available, while those preferring tilapia and carp do so on the basis of taste (see Table 11).

From these and other discussions it seems that the size of fish is an important issue for its acceptability in Swaziland. The Fisheries Section has experienced that farmers who stocked their ponds with T. rendalli or with O. mossambicus are very disappointed with the size of the fish and do not harvest their ponds.

The aspect of size was also confirmed through discussions with two teams of fishermen at the Sifunga dam on the Nyetane river. They were fishing with 4 inch mesh gillnets, and caught only a few fish of 300–600 gr. per day. They mentioned that they could not meet the demand for fish. On why they did not use smaller mesh sizes in order to catch more fish, they answered that smaller fish are not accepted by consumers and cannot be sold.

Because the size of the fish is important the Fisheries Section has focussed its extension on the culture of carp. From the survey however it is clear that most people prefer clarias (24%) above carp (11%) or tilapia (13%).

Table 10. Stated Preferences for Fish Types.

Table 11. Main Reasons for Fish Preferences.

The popularity of catfish and sardines is also reflected in the number of times this type of fish is cited in response to the question “What different types of fish do you know?” (see Table 12).

Table 12. Awareness of Fish Types.

As regards the form in which fish is prepared for meals, responses were limited to fried, boiled, and fried and boiled. The fried form is the most strongly preferred. 75% of all respondents said that this was the way they prepared fish; 16% preferred boiled and 9% both fried and boiled.

The results of the survey indicate that there are no significant barriers to fish consumption by children, pregnant women or from special taboos. All but one of the respondents stated that they feed fish to children and only five stated that pregnant women in the household do not eat fish. Only six respondents stated that there was any taboo against the consumption of fish.

3.5 Extension and community organizations

The results of the survey confirm those of the earlier SSRU survey (Sithole et al, 1989), that extension is weak and most probably one of the major constraints to the development of rural aquaculture. When asked where they got the idea of fish farming, 18 pond owners said they got it from extension visits, 12 from another fish farmer, 5 from themselves, 3 from friends and 5 from other sources, such as Sebenta and Tibiya. 28 pond owners said that they had received advice on fish farming or pond management from extension, with 23 of these saying that it had come from fisheries extension.

However, only six pond owners report that there have been any regular meetings - four of these from general extension workers and two from home economists. No one reports regular meetings among fisheries extensionists. Only 10 owners reported ever attending a meeting on fish farming, and only eight had received an extension visit in the 12 months prior to the interview.

The fisheries extension service supplies fingerlings free of charge to ponds in the region. In five cases they reported having harvested ponds for farmers.

The extent of involvement in community organisations is relatively low. Among the respondents, pond owners were more involved than neighbours and non-neighbours (see Table 13).

Table 13. Involvement in Local Organisations.

Within the Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives, the Department of Agriculture and Extension is divided into sections, of which the Fisheries Section is one. The section has three positions at the ministry headquarters and one extension worker in each of the four regions.

The Fisheries Section runs three fish farms. The Mbabane Fish Farm is a small hatchery constructed for the hatching of trout eggs. The farm has a good water supply, 2 tanks of 8×8 m, 2 of 2×8 m, and one of 4×15 m. At present it is used to store carp and clarias fingerlings before distribution. The Nyetane Fish Farm is located in Lubombo District. It has eight ponds varying from 60 to 4000 m², with a total pond area of almost one hectare. The farm has office space and houses, and new store rooms are under construction. The reservoir feeding the farm was destroyed by a cyclone in 1984, and at present water is pumped from a river. The capacity of the pump is sufficient only to keep one pond full of water. The Mdzimba Fish farm is a cold water farm used for trout. It is the smallest fish farm and is hardly being used.