KENDRAPARA: The fate of around 6,000 fish farmers is hanging in balance after the district administration decided not to supply fingerlings to them for pond fish farming in this season.
Farmers of the district have planned to rear ‘rohu,’ ‘catla’ and ‘mrigal’ fishes over around 5,000 hectares of ponds, for which they need fingerlings. They have been running from pillar to post to get fingerlings, said Maheswar Behera, vice-president of the District Fishermen’s Association. It is not possible for farmers to collect fingerlings from Odisha Pisciculture Development Corporation (OPDC) in Bhadrak district.
The rates of the fingerlings are soaring in the open market due to unholy nexus with the traders and fisheries officials. The official rate of ‘rohu’ fingerlings is Rs 1,100 for one thousand. But the farmers are being forced to purchase sub-standard fingerlings from the market at a cost of Rs 1,400 to Rs 1,600 due to non-supply of fingerlings by the fisheries department,” said Srikant Nayak of Ujanga village under Rajkanika block.
“I had decided to rear fish over my two-acre pond in Olaver village in this rainy season. But I was forced to abandon fish cultivation as the Government decided not to provide any fingerlings to us. I don’t want to take risk by rearing sub-standard fingerlings by purchasing from open markets,” said Rajat Kumar Nayak. District Fisheries Officer Mamata Mohapatra said the OPDC has stocked sufficient fingerlings of various types of fish.
“In the past, we used to supply fishermen fingerlings after getting order from fish farmers. But now, we only provide information about the availability of fingerlings in the OPDC and it is the duty of farmers to purchase fingerlings from them,” he said.