RAJSHAHI, April 3, 2019 (BSS)- A sanctuary has started contributing a lot
towards protecting and conserving the small indigenous fish species from
further degradation in the Padma river and its tributaries.
Shafiul Alam Mukta, a fisherman of Pirijpur village under Godagari Upazila,
along with his boyhood friend Sharat Chandra initiated the sanctuary near his
village in 2014 and attained success within couple of years.
Forty young men of the area also extended their hands with him and now,
within just two years of starting of the project in an experimental basis,
Mukta has now established a large fish sanctuary in the river Padma.
They motivated local fishermen abstaining from fishing of any sort of fish
from that captive water body for eight months. With the banning of catching
fish from the sanctuary for eight months, a large number of fish of various
local species breed there and fishermen of adjacent water bodies started to
catch varieties of endangered and rare species of fish from there.
Talking to BSS here today Mukta said fishing at the sanctuary with net is
prohibited but one can catch fish there by using a fishing rod or fishing
wheel.
“So far, 85 native fish species have been found at the sanctuary of Mukta,”
said Naimul Haque, Assistant Fisheries officer of Godagari upazila. There are
also a large number of Hilsha fish as well. Moreover the fishes which were
supposed to be extinct from the region for a long time were also seen to roam
at the sanctuary.
Shafiu Mukta is now very happy over his cage fish farming as it changed his
fate and made him self-reliant. “I have sold 30,000 kilograms of fish
produced from 37 cages and got profit Taka three lakh,” He said.
Many more youths of the village got profit after being farmed of fish in
cage in the nearby Padma River.
Mukta said: “We have a 20-member cooperative society named ‘Padma Fish
Care’ in Pirijpur village.
To make the sanctuary effective, cage fish farming had been launched there.
In May last year, Department of Fisheries first gave them 20 cages and later
added twenty more.
The department also provided them with fingerlings of monosex tilapia for
rearing in the cages initiating cage fish farming in the river for the first
time. Number of cages has now been stood to over 50.
Prof Bidhan Chandra Das of Department of Zoology in Rajshahi University
said Padma feeds water to its 27 branches and tributaries and a lot of rare
and endangered fish stocks are being released there from this sanctuary in
Godagari.
He mentioned the encouraging youths were working for fish sanctuary without
any monetary benefit. They do not have any income from the fish sanctuary.
Cage culture has bright prospects of yielding around 10,000 tonnes of
additional fishes valued at around Taka 150 crore only in the region
annually. A farmer can easily get neat profit worth Taka 35,000 with primary
investment of Taka four lakh in every month, Prof Bidhan Das added.
Referring to his personal experience Shafiul Mukta said there is an
excellent opportunity of establishing cage fish culture on 30-kilometer water
areas there with employment scope of more than 10,000 people side by side
with boosting significant fish production.