BANGUS HARVESTING STILL GOING ON

THE earlier report that a fishkill struck in Anda town on June 4 was promptly clarified as an isolated fish mortality that happened in Anda town.

Elizabeth Tomas, municipal agriculturist, made the clarification during an online press conference hosted by the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources in coordination with the Philippine News Agency shortly after netizens posted videos of floating bangus harvested in volume allegedly due to fishkill.

She said based on BFAR’s definition, fishkill is a terminology used to describe sudden deaths of fish in an affected area where water condition has low level of dissolved oxygen, with high ammonia, high or salinity.

“Hence the June 4 incident is described as isolated fish mortalities that affected only fish cages in the mouth of Sta. Rita tributary which is away from the Kakiputan Channel,” Tomas pointed out.

“It’s just an inlet of water, not a river. We can’t say it’s a fishkill because the incident was not attributed to low water quality, it was really hot and then there was sudden heavy rainfall,” she added.

Tomas said isolated fish mortalities happen due to circumstances brought by environmental changes like water stratification after a sudden heavy rainfall. Water stratification is the formation of layers of water masses with different properties – salinity, oxygenation, density, temperature – that act as barriers to water mixing.

The affected 125 fish cages only represented 14% of the total number of cages in Anda.

Tomas said the harvested bangus is “very safe for consumption”.

The videos posted in social media platforms that showed bangus left by producers as “simot” to be sold at a bargain price.  A small banca of bangus of “simot” is sold at P4,500 or P25 per kilo.

As of Thursday, price of Anda bangus for four to five pieces a kilo was at P100 in Dagupan while farmgate price was at P80. It’s higher for two to three pieces a kilo from P100 to 120.

The aquaculture industry of bangus raising here using fishcages officially started in 2002 and there are now 820 fishcages, no more fish pens, she said.

Anda contributes about 30 percent of Pangasinan total bangus production. (Eva Visperas)

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