According to the report of Vinh Long Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, although seafood export in the first 9 months of 2010 has faced many difficulties, seafood feed price continuously rose uncorrespondingly to pangasius price, drought and heat prolonged, water level in rivers and canals was lower, salty penetration got deeper; under the great direction efforts of Agriculture and Rural Development sector in accordance with raiser’s efforts and enterprise’s activeness and creation, aquaculture in the provincial area have continued to develop strongly. Both farming area and production increase compared to the same period of last year and are likely to achieve the annual plan. The total farming area up to now is 2,475 ha (reaching 99% of the plan, up 289 ha over the same period last year), the output of the 9 months of 2010 has reached 102,250 tons (accounting for 81.5% of the plan, an increase of 19,048 tons against the same period of last year). The most remarkable is aquaculture in cages and rafts with 655 ones (achieving 119% of the plan, up 130 ones including 518 ones of being farmed). Fisheries farming area in canals and rice field mixture ….are quite large with 2,073 ha. Despite of facing the difficulties because pangasius price is not higher than production cost, farners still maintain 402 ha of ponds and trenches of 304 pangasius farming households (in which 275 ha of ponds and trenches are being farmed currently) with the production of 89,200 tons (up to 19,513 tons compared to the same period of last year).
It is estimated that seafood demand in the last months of the year will increase both domestically and internationally, while the aquaculture and fishery output of importing countries reduce remarkeably in winter. This is the favorable condition to promote aquaculture to meet domestic and international demands. Therefore, the main aquaculture output of the province is likely to reach the annual plan of 133,200 tons (in which pangasius production of 107,800 tons).