economy

The Samjigang Farm in Jaeryong County of South Hwanghae Province has achieved a good result by introducing paddy-field fish farming.

“The paddy-field fish farming is of great economic value. The combination of catfish farming and organic rice cultivation makes it possible to boost per-unit area earnings and the income source of the farm and supply a large amount of fish to the farmers here in the flat area without marine resources,” said Ri Hye Suk, manageress of the farm.

“People usually think that fish farming needs fish farms, but fish farming in paddy fields turns the paddies into fish farms and various microorganisms in them become natural feeds. Therefore, we can save area and labour needed for the construction of fish farms and a large amount of farming materials.”

Many people visit the farm’s paddy field where catfish are raised to learn from its experience. Seeing the field teeming with catfish, they say in admiration that paddy-field fish farming is really worth doing.

“Young catfish released in the paddy in late May now weigh 800g to one kilogram each on average. Whenever I see the fish growing quickly, I’m really elated with work,” said farmer Kim Hyok.

According to him, the calculations based on the estimated paddy rice yield and the fattening rate of fish at present show that the farm will be able to gather ten tons of rice and catch over 60 tons of the fish per hectare.

Rice plants raised in the paddy already show full rice grains, having turned golden unlike those in other fields to the surprise of people.

The field needs neither fertilizer nor agrochemicals nor weeding.

An ordinary paddy field annually requires three to five rounds of fertilizer application, over two rounds of agrochemicals application and three to four rounds of weeding.

So, paddy-field fish farming makes it possible to save farming materials and manpower in no small measure and it is very profitable in terms of soil fertility improvement and land use.

According to information available, the soil fertility of a paddy field where fish are raised for a year is as high as that of a paddy to which a large quantity of quality organic fertilizer has been applied.

The fish pick at the bottom of the paddy field, their excrement improves the soil fertility and water of the field flows to other paddies to quicken the growth of the rice plants in them just like liquid organic fertilizer.

The farm raises loach and mud snails in a paddy field beside the paddy where catfish are raised. Mud snails eat weeds, loaches consume their excrement and the catfish devour loaches to get protein, and such a cyclic production system brings the farm substantial benefit.

Besides, light traps were installed at regular intervals along the fishway to attract insects to be used as natural feed for catfish.

“At the beginning, it was very difficult to do it, but now we are really proud of what we have done. If the quantity of fish produced in one hectare of paddy field is calculated in terms of rice, it is equal to well over a hundred tons. We are going to do paddy-field fish farming of such great economic value on a large scale from next year,” said the manageress.