Akie Hart And Ih Pepple
14 January 2008
(Page 2 of 2)
Potential Harm from Shrimp Farming
Human Rights abuses including murder, rape, false arrests.
Loss of livelihood.
Land conflicts.
Lack of food security and malnutrition.
Displacement of woman from their traditional livelihoods.
Violence against woman.
Destruction of social and cultural fabric of village society.
Migration to already over crowed cities.
Children dropping out of schools to catch shrimp fries.
Loss of biodiversity.
Significant decline in fish resources, the main protein of villagers. Decline in the resources such as livestock, poultry, fuel and fodder. Crisis of drinking water due to salination.
Pollution problems due to the harmful used which destroys livelihood.
Investment from profits earned are not reinvested in the local economy Gross inequality on who received the benefits from those who suffer the consequences.
We have mentioned the reasons why these countries are rejecting shrimp farming is the same reason why we the people of Nigeria (Niger Delta, South East and South West) should reject same. As the introduction of shrimp farming in Nigeria would lead to the total annihilation of our people who have not recovered from the on - going degradation of the physical and human environment.
The Niger Delta is in for another exploitation as the overall set - up processes and operations of Industrial shrimp agriculture are tremendously disruptive to the delicate and complex balance of coastal ecology as vast stretches of invaluable mangrove forest in Rivers, Bayelsa, Delta, Edo, Akwa Ibom, Cross Rivers, Lagos and Ondo states would be cleared to make way for shrimp ponds/ shrimp farms would replace a diverse, multiple resource Nigeria environment with large scale mono - culture operations.
Globally, hundreds of thousands of hectares of valuable mangrove forest has been destroyed by shrimp farming alone and this is only in the last two decades alone, other important coastal habitats of the Niger Delta such as mud flats, sea grass beds and coral reefs would be ruined as it has happened to other nations running away from it and that of South East/South West would also be ruined. Also our once productive farm land which has been degraded by the oil / gas companies would be further left fallow and important water ways and underground aquifers would be further dangerously contaminated as the shrimp industry has been appropriately labelled as slash and burn enterprise which is expanding because of political corruption and collision between government regulatory officials and the richer industry investors who were often referred to as influential people.
Specific Problems with Shrimp Farming
Water
One tragic irony of Industrial shrimp aquaculture is that the process requires clean water yet it has become a source of severe water pollution, often times fouling its own nest in its bid for ever higher shrimp production, the often unrestricted use of chemicals inputs such as antibiotics, pesticides and water additives, when combined with the blind up on the pond bottoms of unused feeds and feces has led to epidemic shrimp diseases and many early pond closures of toxic effluents.
Health
Some of the antibiotics used in shrimp agriculture are closely related to those used in human medical treatment and the questions remains as to the development of resistant strains of human pathogens showing that farming poses real danger of genetic contamination and lowering of biodiversity.
Accidental release of farm raised shrimp or fish can have tremendous repercussions on the native species which may come in contact with them , competition for territory, genetic drift, disease spread and excess demand on available resources are the problems today for example Norway where the number of escaped farming salmon exceeds the total into Norwegian waters.
Food Production Problems
Shrimp aquaculture also affects essential food production processes both agriculture and fisheries are adversely affected. Salination and pollution of both land water ways by shrimp farms ruins both fisheries and crop production in some area, severe rice production losses have caused local agriculture economies to begin importation of what was once the region staple food crop.
Huge Capital needed
Who is being employed and for how long is a crucial question, initial studies conducted in Philippines and India show that much of the local people employment generated by shrimp farms is temporary, requiring high labour inputs only to construct the ponds after initial facility development is completed, the shrimp agriculture Industry is capital incentive rather than labour intensive so on employment problem would be solved by it for example an intensive shrimp agriculture business in India employs just 5 workers while a rice paddy business of equal size requires 50 workers yet in spite of its low local employment needs, shrimp aquaculture is being promoted in developing nations which have abundance of labour and shortage of capital therefore all the profits at the at the expense of the environment would be repatriated abroad.
Indiscriminate Land Use
Our lands would be converted to artificial lakes, which would be abandoned for the construction of Net Lakes / farm without restoration which would lead to the littering of the environment with disused lakes.
Why world powers support shrimp farming
Shrimp Agriculture has become a global industry that has an annual farm gate value of over $6 billion dollars and an annual retail value of over $20 billion dollars and because of this ,shrimp farming gets generous support and incentives from international leading institutes including the word Bank , Asian Development bank and inter - American development Bank because of its profitable nature to consumers nations and lending agencies, the same willingness by the same group to lend money for oil/gas exploration/production activities without minding its cost in the Niger Delta.
Conclusion
Our stand on this issue is that Industrial Shrimp farming in the country as a whole should be discouraged in spite of the Multi-million dollars it is likely to attract for the country. Our environment and our future generations should be considered, as the present happenings in the world, the Tsunamis and Katherinas should inform our decisions.
- Akie Hart and Evang. I. H. Pepple are the Chairman and Secretary of the Nigeria shrimp working group (the shrimp working group is a broad based civil society coalition to tackle industrial shrimp aquaculture in Nigeria).
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Maybe if the method of shrimp farming now being used in Mexico by www.globalseawater.com as developed by http://www.seawaterfoundation.org/newSite/toc.htm was required by your government your community would welcome and even desire it. This method returns desert lands into productive farm land. the polution from the shrimp is used to water and grow trees and other plants that remove carbon form the air thus helping to solve the problems of global warming and even the eventual problems of water levels caused by the melting ice and glaciers in the poles. Hundreds of jobs could become available for local people helping local economies. this method causes NO POLUTION and actually helps the enviroment.