The effects of bad weather and changes in the environment have led to local shrimp farms in the Trà Vinh province suffering heavy losses.
Until the end of March, Trà Vinh has over 7,000 households raising nearly 600 million black tiger shrimp and 2,240 households raising 524 million white leg shrimp. Bad weather causes diseases to spread, mostly HPV infection and white spots. Currently, over 987 households lost 44 million black tiger shrimp and 75 million white leg shrimp.
Dương Văn Đởm, a farmer in Trà Vinh said, “Bad weather and pollution destroyed my entire shrimp killing over 100,000 shrimps in four ponds. I haven’t dared to continue raising shrimp. I’m afraid that they will continue dying.” Besides bad weather, pollution caused by human which has not been solved for years also been killing the shrimp. Normally, the water in the shrimp ponds must be treated before being discharged into the environment but many farmers ignore this. Many households that have dead shrimps didn’t clean the ponds before new seeding. Starting a new crop of shrimp too soon would also have negative effects.
Black tiger shrimp should be raised once a year while farmers can raise two crops of white leg shrimp. But in reality, many people have multiple crops of shrimps in a year. “It’s impossible to warn the farmers now. We’re planning to call for the provincial authorities to issue regulations about shrimp farming. At first, we’ll popularize the regulations for a year and start punishing violators,” Đởm said.
Ha Linh
