Novel local feed ingredients put to the test

A PROJECT to boost omega-3 levels in African and Asian fish farms by using novel feed ingredients held its annual progress meeting recently in Tanzania.

The three-year Sustainable New Feed Ingredients for Promoting Health (SNIPH) project aims to improve the omega-3 levels of farmed tilapia and carps in Kenya, Tanzania, and India.

The scheme, funded by the BBSRC, is for the benefit of lower income local populations which cannot afford increasingly expensive fishmeal within feed formulations.

The project is applying and expanding the current evidence base of nutrient and fatty acid compositions of a range of local, readily available, indigenous materials, including freshwater macrophytes, seaweeds and microbes.

Researchers will assess their availability, feasibility and potential as feed ingredients in terms of nutritional quality, cultivation potential, supply level, and socio-economic viabilities.

This interdisciplinary project is working with a wide range of stakeholders across the value chain, and is now going into a series of on-farm and laboratory based fish trials to assess and compare the performance of fish fed on these diets, as well as the levels of omega-3s present within the fish.

The progress and planning meeting was held at Sokoine University of Agriculture, Morogoro, in Tanzania.

Mary Opiyo, senior research scientist from SNIPH project partners KMFRI, se ng up a farm feed trial at commercial tilapia and ca ish producer Mwea Fish Farm in central Kenya.

Left from top: SNIPH project annual progress and planning meeting with partners from India, the UK, Kenya and Tanzania at Sokoine University of Agriculture, Morogoro, Tanzania.

Aquaculture trial research facilities at Sokoine University of Agriculture overlooked by the scenic Uluguru mountains.