In the course of the Steering Committee meeting a number of economic concepts were used. The seminar leader had the impression that they were not fully understood by all participants and therefore decided to incorporate a few comments on them in the seminar.
Three groups of concepts were addressed: (i) extensive versus intensive aquaculture; (ii) economic viability in the context of rural surveys; and (iii) aquaculture technology and growth.
The farmer tries to produce his fish as cheaply as possible. The cheapest production method is the best. He is not concerned with how the particular factor combination is labelled: to him extensive or intensive has no meaning.
Figure 2 shows an “iso-product” line. The factor combinations indicated by the line each produce the same quantity of tilapia, in this case 50 kg. The farmer will then choose the factor combination which produces the 50 kg at the least expense.
The aquaculturist generally refers to factor combinations at the lower, right part of the iso-product line as extensive aquaculture production methods. In particular it is associated with using large expanses of water, relying basically on naturally available feeds.
It is now conventional wisdom that in non-industrialized countries, this particular combination of factors is the optimum. That may or may not be so. In non-industrialized countries, which are densely populated, the competition for land and water may make such production methods uninteresting. Examples of (water) intensive production methods may as a matter of fact be found in developing economies (e.g.: cage culture in canals in Indonesia), and extensive methods in more advanced economies (carp culture in ponds hundreds of hectares in size on the Hungarian pusta).
Thus, the fact that an aquaculture production method is labelled intensive should not prevent its merits from being examined.
It was pointed out at the seminar that in tropical climates the natural productivity may be higher than in temperate climates which means that with a similar input of factors, a higher production will be achieved.
The economic viability of an activity is a function of the possible technology and the prices of inputs and outputs. How best do we go about establishing the economic viability of rural aquaculture in Southern Africa?
It is evident that we must establish the climatic and hydrographical conditions. This should be fairly straight forward, and there would not seem to be any major differences in the approach to that used in temperature climates or industrialized economies.
We must then attempt to establish prices for inputs and outputs. Here, however, it turns out to be not that easy. There are two principal reasons: (i) the fact that a national economy really consists of a large number of small economies which do not communicate well with each other; (ii) the fact that for many farmers commerce is unimportant.
The typical Zambian farmer's participation in the monetary economy
| INPUTS | PRODUCE FOR : | |||
| SALE | CONSUMPTION | |||
| PURCHASED | ||||
| AVAILABLE ON FARM | ||||
Source of inputs and use of produce
The lack of well-established road, rail and air connections in Southern Africa; the limited number of vehicles in rural areas; and the small volumes of production mean that for most farmers, the geographical area within which he buys inputs and sells his produce is relatively small. The smaller it is, the larger the number of investigations (interviews) that must be conducted in order to ensure nationwide or regionwide coverage of a survey.
For most farming households, at least in rural Zambia, the proportion of purchased inputs, out of the total volume of inputs used for agricultural (and fish culture) production, is small. Similarly the share of the produce that is consumed within the household is relatively large. This is exemplified in Figure 16.
The surveyor will then find it difficult to establish local market prices for inputs which are not purchased, and for the outputs of which no portion is sold. He will be forced to study the alternatives open to the farmer and from these, give a value to inputs and outputs.
In conclusion, the surveys intended to establish the economic (or social) feasibility of any particular fish farming activity will demand highly qualified economists, and will also be extensive in scope. An alternative approach is necessary.
That approach (elaborated during the seminar) has two parts. The first is to use macro-economic data to separate those areas where aquaculture is both likely to be accepted (or if it already exists, to be improved) and contribute to economic growth, from those areas where these two conditions are not likely to be fulfilled.
The second part of the strategy is to inform the farmer in the priority regions about the likely fish production obtained from a certain use of the factors of production (inputs) available to him.
By definition economic growth means an increased availability of goods and services per person. This generally means that the cost of (a mad-day or man-month of) labour increases in comparison with the costs incurred for other inputs.
This in turn means that the factor combination selected by the farmer will change. He will use less of labour and more of some other input. This may coincide with a shift in the technology towards a more intensive technology (as understood by the aquaculturist); that is less use of water and more of some other input (feed, fertilizer). A strong argument for such a change is that a smaller area appears more easy to manage than a larger one.
However, it is known that economic growth occurs simultaneously with: (i) increased specialization; (ii) increased trade (to exchange the surplus production for needed goods and services); and, (iii) increased investment/ person.
This means that in the long run, if African rural aquaculture is to play a role in economic growth and development, it must change. It must become more commercial in nature than it is today, and, it must cease to be a minor, part-time activity. Specialization in fish farming must occur.
Fisheries departments must be prepared to assist in this development. If they do not, aquaculture will be late to benefit from the opportunity generated by an increasing fish shortage (when measured on a per capita basis) in Southern Africa.
