Lake Harvest gains tilapia market share

ZIMBABWE’s largest fish producer, Lake Harvest (LH), has gained 70 percent market share of farmed tilapia since its establishment in 1997, with its incubation facilities now handling 45 million eggs per annum.
Also, about 85 percent of fish feed produced in Zimbabwe is manufactured by LH, according to the company.
It said LH now produces 80 percent of fingerlings in the country.
The firm, whose major operations are in Lake Kariba, said Zimbabwe was well placed to dominate tilapia fish production in the Zambezi River, where neighbouring Zambia is also involved in production at Siavonga.
“Today Lake Harvest produces 70 percent of farmed fish, 85 percent of fish feed and 80 percent of fingerling production in Zimbabwe,” the statement, released to marks 20 years of operations in Zimbabwe, said.
“Lake Harvest is a fully integrated tilapia producer with its own broodstock, hatchery/egg incubation unit handling 45 million eggs per year and growing out operations in 158 cages spread over eight sites on the lake,” LH noted.
It said tilapia farms in Zimbabwe, Zambia and Uganda had seen output rise to 9 000 tonnes in 2017 from 2 500 tonnes in 2009.
“Lake Harvest has fish processing plants for all gutted and filled tilapia, a cold chain distribution unit and its own wholesale and retail outlets to distribute its products throughout the region,” said LH.
The firm said it had benefited from high demand in tilapia output in Zimbabwe, which has been underpinned by “a strong culture of tilapia in its cuisine”.
It said important feed ingredients, including maize and soya bean, were significantly easy to find in Zimbabwe while the lake boasted of highly skilled labour and a stable source of power.
Good infrastructure connections into Zambia and Malawi had also underpinned operations, according to the statement.
LH’s success comes as tycoons who have exploited kapenta in Lake Kariba for decades have indicated that output has been declining.
Zimbabwe has had to complement fish protein from Lake Kariba through imports due to the significant decline in kapenta output, which has seen prices rising.
The lake has been invaded by a deadly alien predator called crayfish, threatening the availability of fish protein.
Crayfish eats almost anything that it finds, including plants, invertebrates, snails, small fish, fish eggs and even its own offspring.
The predator has been spotted in Lake Kariba in massive numbers after it was introduced from Australia for a fish farming project.
It has been breeding out of control, eating the food sources of all fish breeds, including breams, leaving the entire aquatic ecosystem in turmoil.
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