Aquaculture and Food Security in Iraq

Abstract

Inland fishery Iraq's inland fishery is based on the Tigris-Euphrates riverine system, its lakes, and seasonal floods (with a flooded area of 15 000 to 20 000 km 2) and it plays an important role in the country's economy. The Tigris and Euphrates rivers and their branches are the main sources of inland fresh water in Iraq. The inland fresh water bodies cover between 600 000 and 700 000 ha, made up of natural lakes (39%); dams and reservoirs (13.3%), rivers and their branches (3.7%) and marshes (44%). There is a potential to develop these resources through management, stocking and enhancement of extensive culture practices. Fisheries in many small water bodies and reservoirs can be enhanced through stocking and management approaches that take into account particular features of the individual fishery. Stocking and other operations, including quasi-culture methods may, where successful, increase catches significantly. The inland fisheries are based in great part on carps Cyprinus spp., while the most important Iraqi indigenous fishes are barbs belonging to the genus Barbus. Aquaculture Status The total area under aquaculture production in Iraq is estimated to be 7500 ha. The main species cultured is common carp and to a lesser extent grass and silver carp. The mean annual production for 1986-1997 was 4000 t. In 1998, production is reported to have been increased to about 7500 t. A total of 1893 fish farms are licensed for aquaculture, all operated by the private sector (companies and individuals). Ten of the farms are relatively large (100 ha each), but the average is about 4 ha. The only system of aquaculture is in earth ponds. Aquaculture in Iraq depends on freshwater resources, with no marine aquaculture practiced. Sufficient hatcheries are available, although most production is of common carp. Cage farming expanded in the early 1980's Habania Lake, but was eventually abandoned for commercial production, limiting its use for research 5 . The latest information available indicates that the total area under fish farming is estimated at 7500 ha consisting of about 1900 farms. They are mostly near sources of fresh water where the land is not suitable for agriculture. The size of these farms range between 0.5 ha and 200 ha but most are between 5 and 10 ha each. These are earthen ponds with out proper lining or insulation. Only the Babel fish farm, a government owned venture, is an integrated farm that is fully insulated and well equipped, established on a 500 ha area. All other farms are smaller, owned and operated by private companies and individuals. Productivity per unit area is low in most fish farms, ranging from 1400 to 2000 kg/ha. This is attributed mainly to the shortage of adequate fish feed. Iraq When notions of natural resources come to mind in the Arab world, most people think of oil, gas and phosphates. In an area where most climates are arid, it would be difficult to imagine aquaculture even exists in the region, let alone has expansion potential 1 . In Mesopotamia one of the sources of early human civilization, fish, crustacean, molluscs and turtles in the Euphrates and Tigris rivers with their tributaries and the coastal waters of the Arabian/Persian gulf were a major food source already 5000 years ago 2 . Water diversion has caused serious environmental damage to large areas of Iraq's wetlands. Thick reed beds teeming with life once covered 8,000 square miles (20,480 square kilometers). Now 97 percent of the main marshes are dry. Less than one-third is left of eastern marshes that reach into Iran. Rice paddies and fishing grounds are gone. Some birds are now extinct 3 , and global migrations have been disrupted. When the wind blows, blinding sandstorms strip off what topsoil remains. The marshes have suffered badly during the political upheavals of the past few decades. According to the UN Environment Program, some 7,000 square miles, or a staggering 93 percent, of the Mesopotamian Marshes drained between 1991 and 2000. This has had a serious impact on the estimated 1 billion migratory birds -flamingoes, storks, cranes -that used to stop over on flights between Asia and Africa. Tribesman no longer haul 500-pound fish to market in trucks. Vanished, too, probably, are endangered species such as the smooth-coated otter 4 . Marsh Arab villages still cling to some of those roads. They look like Arab villages anywhere, including the middle of the Sahara. The only clues to their aquatic origins lie in stately council houses, with cathedral-like spires, constructed entirely of bleached reeds.

Full text

January-March 2004 (Vol. IX No. 1) 31
Aquaculture and Food Security in Iraq
M.R. Kitto & Mohd. Tabish
Gulf International Co., Box 36420, Raas 24755, Kuwait, E-mail: oceanwatch7@hotmail.com
Inland fishery
Iraq’s inland fishery is based on the
Tigris-Euphrates riverine system, its
lakes, and seasonal floods (with a
flooded area of 15 000 to 20 000 km2)
and it plays an important role in the
country’s economy. The Tigris and
Euphrates rivers and their branches are
the main sources of inland fresh water
in Iraq. The inland fresh water bodies
cover between 600 000 and 700 000 ha,
made up of natural lakes (39%); dams
and reservoirs (13.3%), rivers and their
branches (3.7%) and marshes (44%).
There is a potential to develop these
resources through management,
stocking and enhancement of extensive
culture practices. Fisheries in many
small water bodies and reservoirs can
be enhanced through stocking and
management approaches that take into
account particular features of the
individual fishery. Stocking and other
operations, including quasi-culture
methods may, where successful,
increase catches significantly. The
inland fisheries are based in great part
on carps Cyprinus spp., while the most
important Iraqi indigenous fishes are
barbs belonging to the genus Barbus.
The most common commercially
important fishes in Iraq are:
Marine fishes
•Tenualosa ilisha
• Liza oligolepis
• Pampus argenteus
• Arius thalassinus
• Acanthocybium solandri
Freshwater fishes
•Cyprinus sharpey
• Barbus xanthopterus
• Barbus grypus
• Liza abu
• Silurus triostegus
• Barbus luteus
• Asalus eorase
• Cyprinus carpio
Main culture species
•Cyprinus carpio
• Hypophthalmichthys molitrix
• Ctenopharyngodon idellus
Aquaculture Status
The total area under aquaculture
production in Iraq is estimated to be
7500 ha. The main species cultured is
common carp and to a lesser extent
grass and silver carp. The mean annual
production for 1986-1997 was 4000 t. In
1998, production is reported to have
been increased to about 7500 t. A total
of 1893 fish farms are licensed for
aquaculture, all operated by the private
sector (companies and individuals).
Ten of the farms are relatively large
(100 ha each), but the average is about
4 ha. The only system of aquaculture is
in earth ponds. Aquaculture in Iraq
depends on freshwater resources, with
no marine aquaculture practiced.
Sufficient hatcheries are available,
although most production is of
common carp. Cage farming expanded
in the early 1980’s Habania Lake, but
was eventually abandoned for
commercial production, limiting its use
for research5.
The latest information available
indicates that the total area under fish
farming is estimated at 7500 ha
consisting of about 1900 farms. They
are mostly near sources of fresh water
where the land is not suitable for
agriculture. The size of these farms
range between 0.5 ha and 200 ha but
most are between 5 and 10 ha each.
These are earthen ponds with out
proper lining or insulation. Only the
Babel fish farm, a government owned
venture, is an integrated farm that is
fully insulated and well equipped,
established on a 500 ha area. All other
farms are smaller, owned and operated
by private companies and individuals.
Productivity per unit area is low in
most fish farms, ranging from 1400 to
2000 kg/ha. This is attributed mainly to
the shortage of adequate fish feed. Iraq
When notions of natural resources
come to mind in the Arab world, most
people think of oil, gas and
phosphates. In an area where most
climates are arid, it would be difficult to
imagine aquaculture even exists in the
region, let alone has expansion
potential1. In Mesopotamia one of the
sources of early human civilization,
fish, crustacean, molluscs and turtles in
the Euphrates and Tigris rivers with
their tributaries and the coastal waters
of the Arabian/Persian gulf were a
major food source already 5000 years
ago2.
Water diversion has caused serious
environmental damage to large areas of
Iraq’s wetlands. Thick reed beds
teeming with life once covered 8,000
square miles (20,480 square kilometers).
Now 97 percent of the main marshes are
dry. Less than one-third is left of
eastern marshes that reach into Iran.
Rice paddies and fishing grounds are
gone. Some birds are now extinct3, and
global migrations have been disrupted.
When the wind blows, blinding
sandstorms strip off what topsoil
remains.
The marshes have suffered badly
during the political upheavals of the
past few decades. According to the UN
Environment Program, some 7,000
square miles, or a staggering 93
percent, of the Mesopotamian Marshes
drained between 1991 and 2000. This
has had a serious impact on the
estimated 1 billion migratory birds -
flamingoes, storks, cranes - that used
to stop over on flights between Asia
and Africa. Tribesman no longer haul
500-pound fish to market in trucks.
Vanished, too, probably, are
endangered species such as the
smooth-coated otter4. Marsh Arab
villages still cling to some of those
roads. They look like Arab villages
anywhere, including the middle of the
Sahara. The only clues to their aquatic
origins lie in stately council houses,
with cathedral-like spires, constructed
entirely of bleached reeds.

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aquaculture Asiaaquaculture Asia
aquaculture Asia
32
has had no trade in fish and fishery
products due to economic sanctions
imposed on the country since19916.
The fisheries sector in Iraq is currently
of no significant value to the national
economy due to absence of export and
import activities at present.
Fisheries research and related
activities are carried out at a number of
sites by various institutions – the Fish
Research Center (Zeafaraniyah,
Baghdad), Marine Science Center,
Basra, Agriculture Research Center
IPA, Central Hatchery at Swairah,
Fisheries and Marine Resources
Department, College of Agriculture,
Basra.
Future trends
Today, when the sky itself seems to
melt into chrome-coloured lakes-
rippling pools that shimmer like mirrors
in the vast salt pans of southern Iraq.
These days, however, those liquid
sheets of light are no mirage. They are
real water - unshackled for the first time
in years, the Tigris and Euphrates
rivers were now refilling thousands of
acres of dry marsh4.
The turmoil in Iraq since the 1960s
does not provide a solid foundation for
establishing a national agricultural and
food system. In some parts of the
country, from the Southwestern
Bedouins to the Northeastern Kurds,
traditional self-reliant food systems
have been maintained. However, in
most of the country, food security has
necessitated imports both of
carbohydrates and proteins. Vitamins
and micronutrients have all too often
been in short supply. Today’s outlook
for international food relief and
agricultural technology does not bode
well for short- or long-term community
or national food security in Iraq.
Interim measures have focused on
importing wheat and emergency food,
rather than on building self-sufficiency
in food production.
While neighboring Kuwait, Bahrain
and the UAE have invested in fish
farming, especially in shrimp
production Iraq’s 2001 total fish
production was 22,800 tons of which
only 2000 tons come from aquaculture.
Situated in what is historically known
as the Fertile Crescent, Iraq is supplied
with copious amounts of water from the
Tigris and Euphrates. In addition to
this, there are water resources in the
form of lakes and ponds, especially in
the northern part of the country and
the Shatt Al-Arab delta area in the
south. Testament to this is the amount
of development that took place in Iraqi
fish farming before 1990. Now, more
than ever, as the country looks for
ways to feed itself, aquaculture may be
an area of serious growth. However,
many of the farms have fallen into
disrepair because of poor management
and lack of investment under economic
sanctions. Due to their importance to
the country’s present and future needs,
they should be considered as a major
investment opportunity. Fisheries
should not by any means be
considered a side or marginal activity
and should be given sufficient, priority,
support and protection to allow growth
and development.
Research needs
Aquaculture research needs vary with
development priorities and constraints
at the country level, but key research
targets in many countries of the region
include: Sustainable intensification of
production from existing freshwater
pond farms, development of culture-
based fisheries, including the
evaluation of the potential for
development and selection of species,
development of viable models for
integrated aquaculture-agriculture
systems, including the development of
low-input polyculture systems,
development of management strategies
to reduce the use of water in pond fish
farming, development of aqua feeds
from locally available ingredients (at
the national or farm level) and
improvement of feeding strategies,
seed production and improvement of
the genetic quality of brood stock,
optimization of production economies
and market analysis, diversification of
species for marine aquaculture6.
In order to sufficiently develop
aquaculture, governmental and
research agencies should improve
research, the results applied inland and
along the coastlines. Research in
aquaculture must address
improvements in technologies,
contribute to reduction in the cost of
production, and consider the
increasing need to ensure that
aquaculture is eco-friendly and that
farming native and popular species on
demanded as well as the possible
introduction of new exotic species can
be achieved without endangering the
ecological balance. Sustainable
aquaculture development calls for
strategies to improve the quality of
water used by the fish farmers, and
farm management technologies, as well
as environment befriendly coastal and
inland water sites. If these are ensured,
Greening aquaculture - quest for success with Euphrates river shining like a mirror.
Table 1: Fresh water aquaculture production (t) in Iraq8
Year 1997 1998 1999 2000
Production (t) 3400 7500 2183 1745

January-March 2004 (Vol. IX No. 1) 33
aquaculture projects can be efficiently,
effectively and profitably implemented7.
Iraq must have its own unique
agricultural and food system. It cannot
copy other countries. Its situation and
potential are unique. There are great
variations in its climate and landscape
from South to North. The Kurdish diet
in the North owes much to the cultures
rooted in Turkey, Armenia, Azerbaijan,
and the Kurdistan portion of
neighboring Iran. Mountainside
herding and valley orchards and
gardens are typical. In the South, the
diet has similarities to that of the
peoples of the Persian Gulf and Central
Iran. Iraq’s agricultural and food
system must be based on its traditional
preferences and on what it can learn
from other Middle Eastern countries,
and from countries around the world,
that have promoted small-scale farming
systems.
Strategies that would help Iraqi
farmers and citizens to reinvent their
food system are implementing Iraq
technologies such as aquaculture and
the use of waste water, building up
locally-based food systems rather than
top-down ones, involving women and
the failed system of preceding
generations, can only come “on-site”
and not on-page, through field visits of
Iraqi leaders and farmers to the
practices of sustainable small-scale
agriculture and self-reliant food
systems.
References
1. US-Arab Tradeline. 2003. Arab Aquaculture
investment deepens- Scott Bortot. 1st May 2003.
2. Sahrhage, D. Fishing and fish culture in ancient
Mesopotamia 1999. Frankfurt-am-Main-FRG. Peter
Lang 1999.341.pp.
3. The New Scientist. 2003. Future looks bleak for
Iraq’s fragile environment-Fred Pearce. 15 March
2003.
4. The Telegraph 2003. Iraqi nomads break Saddam’s
dams, levees to let river flow- World column, 19 June
2003- By Paul Salopek, Chicago Tribune.
5. El Gamal, A.R. 2001. Status and development trends
of aquaculture in the Near East. In R.P. Subhasinghe,
P. Bueno, M.J.Phillips, C. Hough, S.E. McGladdery
& J.R. Arthur, etc. Aquaculture in the Third
Millennium. Technical proceedings of the Conference
on aquaculture in the Third Millennium, Bangkok,
Thailand, 20-25 Feb 2000, pp. 357-376, NACA,
Bangkok and FAO, Rome.
6. FAN. 1996. Major trends in Global Aquaculture.
Production and summary overview of the Gulf area
(1984-1994)-K.Rana, M. Perotti, M. Pedini, A.
Tacon, FAO Aquaculture Newsletter No. 13, 1996.
7. Izzat Feidi 2003 Fisheries in Iraq-role in food
security. Infofish International 3/2003.p.58-61.
8. Izzat Feidi 2003. Boosting fish supplies-Arab States,
Samudra, March 2003. p. 3-7
Entrepreneurship problems of shrimp
farmers in planning, project preparation
and project implementation stages
K. Ponnusamy
Central Institute of Brackishwater Aquaculture, 75, Santhome High Road, Chennai-600 028, Tamil Nadu, India
Aquaculture makes a very strong
contribution to foreign exchange
earnings, food production and
employment generation in India. The
profitability of shrimp farming has been
relatively high as the entrepreneurs
have been able to realise their
investment in a couple of years.
However, the current state of the
industry is quite volatile due to global
trade and market access concerns,
uncertainty over regulation of the
industry and relatively low levels of
cooperation between farmers. If the
potential contributions of aquaculture
youth as a priority, and including both
rural and urban systems, from rooftop
gardens to hillside farms. The objective
will be to create a new agricultural /
food system in Iraq based on
Mesopotamian history and leading
edge 21st century Middle East
agricultural technology. The process
should aim at digesting what has been
learned at the wider-level meetings and
reaching preliminary decisions
concerning new farming methods,
restoring old farming methods, and
establishing pilot farms. Another goal
would be to define what is missing in
terms of what is needed for education,
supplies and hardware to implement the
new food systems. Demonstration
farms in several places throughout Iraq
would be an early imperative, to
provide training facilities and technical
assistance to women, youth and men.
Foreign assistance, primarily from
Middle Eastern countries, will be
needed if some of the relatively new
farming methods are to be adopted.
Exchange programs involving young
innovative farmers are essential. Above
all, the inspiration and understanding
to start a new system, and not revert to
are to be realised the issues and
challenges faced by the entrepreneurs
need to be determined. We conducted a
random survey of 50 shrimp
entrepreneurs to assess their views on
the social, economic, psychological,
technological, environmental and
political problems facing the industry.
The survey was carried out in May
May 2001 in Nagapattinam and
Tiruvallur districts of Tamil Nadu state
of India. Nagapattinam district was
selected due to the presence of the
highest number of shrimp
entrepreneurs having the maximum area
under shrimp culture; while Tiruvallur
district was chosen, because it has
maximum availability of infrastructural
facilities in coastal areas for
development of shrimp farming.The
major issues raised by the
entrepreneurs are summarised below.