HANOI, Feb 21 (Xinhua): Vietnam is set to develop a more sustainable aquaculture industry which is expected to expand 4.5 percent year on year, earning US$12 billion in export revenues by 2030, local newspaper Vietnam News reported Tuesday.
The Vietnamese government has approved a national programme to bolster aquaculture production, which is vulnerable to climate change and natural disasters.
The South-East Asian country will strive to scale up its aquaculture sector in the upcoming years to reach an annual production target of 7 million tons through a number of long-term policy initiatives with a focus on farming infrastructure as well as seed production and supply.
According to the Vietnam Association of Seafood Exporters and Producers, aquaculture productivity in Vietnam has increased over the years even though the total water surface area for aquaculture has remained stable.
Seafood and other aquatic products, such as farmed pangasius fish and shrimp, are among Vietnam's top exports to China, Europe, Japan, and the United States.
However, experts said if no strategy was carried out to mitigate risks from climate change, Vietnam's aquaculture will be hit hard.
A World Bank study reported pangasius and shrimp farmers in the Mekong Delta region might suffer income losses of up to 38,000 U.S. dollars per hectare by 2050.
Besides, Vietnamese farmers will have to pay extra costs to fight against climate change adversity such as raising the height of dikes and building new drainage systems.
Hence the program aims to help transform the country's small-scale aquaculture industry, which is likely to be seriously affected by climate change, into a sustainable and climate-resilient production and processing center.
Last year, Vietnam's seafood exports hit a record high of nearly 11 billion U.S. dollars, up 23.1 percent from the year before despite the impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Vietnam's agro-forestry-fishery exports posted 53.2 billion U.S. dollars in revenues last year, accounting for about 75 percent of the country's overall trade surplus, according to the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development. - Xinhua
