Lorenzo Juarez Takes Position as Deputy Manager of NOAA’s Aquaculture Program

Lorenzo Juarez, former manager of Shrimp Improvement Systems, a shrimp broodstock company in Florida, USA, has taken a position with NOAA’s Aquaculture Program.  “NOAA” stands for National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration, a scientific agency within the United States Department of Commerce.

Here’s NOAA’s news release on the hiring:

“We are happy to announce that Lorenzo Juarez will join NOAA’s Aquaculture Program as Deputy Manager in September 2010.  Mr. Juarez will provide the day-to-day management of the program office.  Active in commercial marine aquaculture and research since 1983, Mr. Juarez has extensive experience in the husbandry, management, and policy aspects of aquaculture.  He has worked for several large shrimp aquaculture companies, most recently as general manager of an international shrimp breeding company based in Florida.  Mr. Juarez also served as President of the World Aquaculture Society from 2008 to 2009.  He has taught courses in aquaculture at the Florida Keys Community College in Key West, Florida and at the Universidad Marista in Yucatan, Mexico.  He is the author of three book chapters, 15 peer-reviewed articles, and numerous conference presentations publications in trade magazines.  Mr. Juarez has a B.S. from Monterrey Technical Institute, Mexico and a Masters of Aquaculture from Auburn University.”

Information: To get onto the mailing list for News Flash, contact: NOAA Aquaculture Program, 1315 East-West Highway, SSMC3, 13th Floor, Route F Silver Spring, Maryland 20910, USA (phone 1-301-713-9079, email noaa.aquaculture@noaa.gov).

Source: News Flash (the free, email newsletter of the NOAA Aquaculture Program).  NOAA Aquaculture Program Hires Juarez as Deputy Manager.  August 17, 2010.

Country Reports

Australia

Shrimp Farmers Want Country-of-Origin Labeling on Restaurant Menus

It’s illegal to sell a fake Rolex watch in Australia, but not fake shrimp.

Nick Moore, president of the Australian Prawn Farmers Association, said supermarkets are required to use country-of-origin labels on seafood, but restaurants and fish and chip shops are not.  He said that was a glaring omission.  “It’s time our politicians sorted this out.  ...With the federal election just a few weeks away, now is the time for politicians to deliver improved country-of-origin labeling for cooked seafood.  ...Consumers want and deserve to know where their seafood is coming from, and Australian farmers need to be able to get their message across at the point many consumers are purchasing seafood—on the restaurant menu.”

Source: The Sydney Morning Herald.  Fish Farmers Want New Labeling Rules.  August 4, 2010.

Australia

Queensland—Farmed Shrimp Statistics 2006–2009

Due to its location in the Southern Hemisphere, summer in Australia occurs from December through February, so the shrimp farming season straddles the year change, and year-to-year statistical comparisons always look something like this “2006-2007 to 2007-2008”.

In 2008-2009, farmed shrimp production increased to 3,821 metric tons, a record for Queensland, up 30% from 2,888 metric tons in 2007-2008.  Average yields per hectare were up 26%, and the value of the crop increased 30%, from $38.1 million in 2007-2008 to $50.1 million in 2008-2009.  Twenty-two farms produced shrimp in 2008-2009, compared to twenty-five in 2007-2008.  The average farm gate price decreased marginally from $13.17/kg in 2007-2008 to $13.09/kg in 2008-2009.

In the 2008–2009 production year (the most recent), two penaeid species dominated shrimp farming in Queensland: the giant tiger shrimp (Penaeus monodon) and the banana shrimp (P. merguiensis).  Kuruma shrimp (P. japonicus) production has almost ceased in Australia.

The number of hectares in production dropped 7%, from 718 hectares in 2007-2008 to 669 hectares in 2008-2009.

Source: Summary Report to Farmers/Aquaculture Production Survey Queensland 2008–2009.  Queensland Department of Employment, Economic Development and Innovation.  Ross Lobegeiger and Max Wingfield.  Marine Prawns.  Page-5.  June 2010.

Australia

Unraveling Vannamei’s Genome

From Abstract: “The Pacific white shrimp (Penaeus vannamei) is the world’s most widely farmed penaeid species (~75% of global shrimp production) with a...value of approximately $8.1 billion.  Despite its importance, knowledge of its genome structure and the genetic basis underlying important production traits (for example, disease resistance and growth) and their interaction are lacking.

This project uses high-throughput DNA sequencing/genotyping to characterize the genome of P. vannamei and aims to identify genome-wide genetic markers linked to quantitative trait loci (QTL) that can be used to maximize genetic gains through marker assisted selection breeding programs.  Furthermore, this project also creates an invaluable genomic resource useful to the identification of genetic markers in other shrimp species and in understanding the biology and evolution of penaeid genomes in general.

We are currently using Roche 454 FLX Titanium and Illumina GAIIx deep-sequencing technologies to sequence the P. vannamei transcriptome at ~50-100x average coverage.  This process will not only enable the rigorous assembly and annotation of 10,000+ EST/genes, but will also deliver the most comprehensive database of high-quality shrimp SNPs to date.  Utilizing this information, a genome-wide SNP array chip (>3,000 highly informative SNPs) will be developed and genotyped across more than 1,000 phenotyped individuals.  Following this, a comprehensive genome-wide dense genetic linkage map (~1-2cM average inter-marker distance) and linkage disequilibrium block map will be developed and used to identify QTLs with tightly linked genetic markers for marker assisted selection applications.

The development of these genetic resources will not only be used to identify QTLs influencing commercially important traits such as disease resistance and growth, but will also...increase our understanding of genome structure and its evolution in crustaceans.  Furthermore, the genomic information developed will be an invaluable in silico [performed on computer or via computer simulation, a play on in vivo and in vitro] resource for researchers working towards the identification of QTL in other commercially important penaeids by providing a comparative framework map on which current and new genetic data can be anchored.  Details of this project—including full transcriptome sequence data assembly, polymorphic marker identification, genome map development and QTL investigations—will be discussed, along with the potential of these new sequencing technologies to rapidly develop genetic knowledge for species where previously little genetic data was available.”

Source: World Aquaculture Society.  The CD/Abstracts of World Aquaculture 2010.  Unraveling the Genome of a Global Aquaculture Species—Towards the Creation of a Genomic Resource and Quantitative Trait Loci Detection in Pacific Whiteleg Shrimp, Litopenaeus vannamei.  Kyall R. Zenger (kyall.zenger@jcu.edu.au) and Dean R. Jerry (Aquaculture Genetics Research Program, School of Marine and Tropical Biology, James Cook University, Townsville, Queensland, Australia).  San Diego, California, USA, March 2010.

Australia

Western Australia—Wild Shrimp, Virus Free

According to the Western Australia Department of Fisheries Senior Pathologist Dr. Brian Jones, a major testing program has shown that shrimp caught off the northwest coast of Western Australia do not carry: IHHNV (Infectious Hypodermal and Haematopoietic Necrosis Virus), WSSV (Whitespot Syndrome Virus) or GAV (Gill-Associated Virus).

“GAV does occur in the Joseph Bonaparte Gulf on the WA/Northern Territory border, where it is believed to have established itself following escapes from NT shrimp farms stocked with infected Queensland shrimp,” said Jones.  “Apart from that specific location though, which has been known about for five years, GAV has not been detected anywhere else in WA.”

Strains of the highly infectious IHHNV virus were found in five Queensland shrimp farms in 2008.  It is important that the government continue working to protect Western Australia’s wild caught shrimp fisheries from imports of infected live Queensland shrimp, said Jones, adding that wild shrimp must be tested on a regular basis to maintain the state’s virus-free claim.  That testing, which started in 2009, targets all the shrimp fisheries on the Northwest Shelf as far north as Broome.

“Biosecurity is a vitally important factor in maintaining the health of Western Australia’s fisheries and the department has been involved in projects to help enhance the State’s marine defenses, through strategies and equipment to diagnose and identify potential and present risks,” said Jones.

Source: FIS United States.  WA Prawns Virus Free.  Natalia Real (editorial@fis.com).  August 3, 2010.

Australia

Bids on Broodstock

Australian scientists have developed a “super” tiger shrimp (Penaeus monodon), and now the race is on to protect it from genetic poachers.  The question is how to maintain breeding control of the new tigers, which grow about 20 percent faster than other tiger shrimp.  Nigel Preston, the lead researcher on the project to develop the new shrimp, likened it to owning a pedigreed horse: “You don’t want other people using it without paying a stud fee.”  The current plan is to produce single-sex seedstock that can be farmed, but not bred.  “We want to grow [the industry] to several billion dollars so we can provide Australian consumers with more local product,” said Dr. Preston.

Australia’s CSIRO (Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization) has received 22 expressions of interest in its shrimp-breeding technique since the new shrimp was officially announced to the world in June 2010.

Source: The Sydney Morning Herald.  Super Prawn’s Powers Surface, Now Identity Must Be Guarded.  Jacqui Taffel.  August 3, 2010.

Bangladesh

Forced Labor, Human Trafficking and Child Bondage in the Shrimp Industry

Harvard human trafficking fellow Siddharth Kara is undertaking a research trip around South Asia, looking at issues of forced labor, trafficking and child bondage.  Here’s his report on the shrimp farming industry.

Mushiganj, Bangladesh...This week I want to write to you about shrimp.  Portions of the shrimp industry in Bangladesh involve almost every aspect of contemporary forms of labor exploitation: child labor, bonded labor, forced labor, and indirectly, human trafficking.

I have traveled to the farthest tip of the southwest quadrant of Bangladesh, beyond which lies the uninhabitable Sundarbans mangrove forest.  The shrimp supply chain starts here and it has three steps: baby shrimp collection, shrimp farming and shrimp processing.

In the pouring rain, I took a rickety wooden boat into the muddy-brown Kholpetua River.  Soon, I came upon more than four hundred smaller wooden boats.  Each had one or two shrimp collectors who spread a fine blue mesh in the water.  Once an hour they pulled the mesh out of the water to harvest the baby shrimp.

“I catch thirty or forty baby shrimp each hour,” a twelve year-old boy named Abdul told me.  Children like Abdul will spend most of the day collecting shrimp, then return to shore to sell their catch to shrimp farmers.  Roughly seven out of ten collectors I counted were children.  They make around $0.01 for each baby shrimp they sell.

The second step in the process is shrimp farming.  Fifteen years ago, large commercial interests overran this area with shrimp farms, so now there are no other employment options for the local people.  Giant tiger shrimp are the main crop, and they require saline water.  This means nothing else can grow—no agriculture, horticulture, or land for grazing animals.

Shrimp farmers like Aziz have to borrow money from the landowner in order to lease land for shrimp farming.  “The landowner charges me fifty percent interest,” Aziz said.  This makes it difficult for him to earn enough money each season to pay back his debts, forcing him to undertake unpaid labor for the landowner during the off-season.  In other words, he is a shrimp farming bonded laborer.

Aziz cultures the baby shrimp for roughly three months until they are fully grown.  He can sell top grade shrimp for $0.13 each.  After expenses there is very little left over, especially when faced with a ruined crop thanks to natural disasters like Hurricane Aila.

Giant shrimp farms require far fewer people to manage than a rice field.  This means that tens of thousands of farmers are now out of a livelihood.

The last step in the shrimp supply chain is the exceedingly secretive shrimp processing industry.  Big companies control this step, which includes sorting, de-heading, shelling, freezing and shipping.

I heard many anecdotes of child labor and forced labor inside the processing plants, but my attempts to verify this were unsuccessful.  No one would speak to me, and even when approaching some plants by foot, I was met by armed guards who told me to leave.  One plant did open its doors, but I did not find anything untoward, other than the fact that the workers were paid only between $1.30 and $2.00 per day by a company that will make almost $8 million in 2010.

Source: CNN.  On the Trail of Child Labor in Bangladesh.  Siddharth Kara.  August 3, 2010.

Canada

Allergenic Proteins In Giant Tiger Shrimp (Penaeus monodon)

Crabs, lobsters, prawns and shrimps cause allergies in many people.  In fact, crustaceans are said to be the third highest source of food-induced allergenic reactions after peanuts and tree nuts.  But it is not only consumers who are at risk.  Seafood workers are also susceptible because some of the crustacean allergens are soluble in water and come in contact with fingers and hands during processing.  Crustacean allergens can also find their way into the air.

The giant tiger shrimp (Penaeus monodon) is recognized as one of the more allergenic penaeid species, inducing type I-mediated food hypersensitivity involving immunoglobulin E.  The proteins tropomyosin and arginine kinase have been implicated as the allergenic factors, with prevalence rates for contact dermatitis and occupational asthma of 3-11% and 7-36%, respectively!

Source: Proteomics.  Allergenic Prawn Proteins.  Steve Down.  August 1, 2010.

Ecuador

Reference Prices August 2010

Source: Boletin Informativo (Ecuador’s Cámara Nacional de Acuacultura).  Editor, Jorge Tejada (jtejada@cna-ecuador.com).  Precios Preferenciales del Camarón.  August 9, 2010.

Indonesia

CP Prima Reports $30 Million Lost in First Half of 2010

CP Prima, one of the largest shrimp farming operations in the world, has reported a loss of $30 million for the first half of 2010, compared to a profit of $6.7 million in the first half of 2009.  Its sales declined 22 percent to $308 million, from $395.5 million the previous year.  As of June 30, 2010, CP Prima’s assets totaled $933.2 million, while its liabilities amounted to $607.7 million.

Source: FIS United States.  CP Prima Figures Slide.  Analia Murias (editorial@fis.com).  August 3, 2010.

Indonesia

Some Facts on the IMN Virus

The spread of the infectious myonecrosis (IMN) virus in Lampung Province has brought down production of white shrimp (Penaeus vannamei) by 70%.  It’s the worst shrimp epidemic in ten years.  The average harvest has been reduced to 1.5 metric tons per hectare from 6 tons.  In March 2010, PT Prima Nusa, a big shrimp farm in Lampung Province, stopped stocking 95% its ponds, hoping to break the disease cycle.  Farmers said they have tried everything from specialized feeds to probiotics to overcome the virus.  It attacks when the shrimp are 50 to 60 days old.  They continue to feed, but at a lower rate.  At harvest, prices of infected shrimp are lower than those for healthy shrimp.  According to data from the regional office of the Department of Marine Affairs and Fisheries, Lampung Province produced 75,223 metric tons of farmed shrimp in 2009, compared to 144,264 tons in 2008.

Source: AQUA Culture AsiaPacific (Editor/Publisher, Zuridah Merican, email zuridah@aquaasiapac.com).  News in Brief/IMNV in Indonesia.  Volume-6, Number-4, Page-6, July/August 2010.

Malaysia

Kentucky Fried Shrimp

On August 3, 2010, KFC Holdings/Malaysia launched a new Hot and Spicy Shrimp menu at 12 drive-thru outlets.  Currently, KFC Holdings has 495 outlets nationwide, including 32 drive-thru outlets.  Jamaludin Ali, managing director, said, “We want to focus on the drive-thru concept.  ...We are aiming to have a minimum of one drive-thru outlet in each state.”  KFC Holdings had revenues of $190 million in the first quarter of 2010, up 14 percent from the corresponding period in 2009.

Source: Bernama.  KFC to Expand with at Least 20 New Outlets Next Year.  August 3, 2010.

Mexico

Sonora—Whitespot Outbreak Update

Humberto Olea Miguel Ruiz, president of the Committee of Aquacultural Health in Sonora (COSAES), says ninety shrimp farms in Sonora have been hit with whitespot.  “The productive and economic impact will only be truly known after the completion of the final harvest,” said Ruiz Olea.  He said that production could be reduced by 50 percent this year, compared to 2009.

Experts from COSAES recommend that farmers attempt to keep their production costs as low as possible and complete their harvests in September, before low temperatures make the problem worse.

In the state of Sinaloa, whitespot hit Ahome shrimp farms in June 2010.  To avoid losing everything, farmers immediately harvested their ponds, even though the shrimp were only eight grams at the time.

Source: FIS United States.  Economic Impact of White Spots Still Unknown.  Analia Murias (editorial@fis.com).  August 6, 2010.

Scotland

The Tadpole Shrimp—The Oldest Animal on Earth!

A rare shrimp, believed to be the most ancient animal on Earth, is alive and well in Scotland.  Two colonies of the tadpole shrimp, Triops cancriformis, were found at Caerlaverock on the Solway Coast of Dumfriesshire.  Fossil findings have revealed that the shrimp is virtually the same today as it was 200 million years ago, when the first dinosaurs evolved.  Today, they live in temporary water pools.  When the water dries up, the adults die, but leave behind eggs that can remain dormant for years until wet conditions return.

Source: BioScholar.  “Most Ancient” Animal Species on Earth Discovered in Scotland.  July 30, 2010.

United States

California—Spiny Lobster Moms

At the Cabrillo Marine Aquarium (a facility of the City of Los Angeles’ Department of Recreation and Parks), Adrienne McColl (left), a teenage intern volunteer, and Cora Webber (right), a lab assistant, are studying the possibility of farming spiny lobsters.  Like other researchers before them, they want to raise California spiny lobsters in captivity.  “We were joking that if you could raise a California spiny lobster in captivity you’d be famous,” said Webber.  “It’s just plain old fun seeing how far you can get.”  No one has ever before reared the locally abundant California spiny lobsters (Panulirus interruptus), also called rock lobsters, from birth through their arduous first year and into adulthood.

This is the fourth year Webber has tried to raise spiny lobsters.  In the past three years, she’s carefully nursed hundreds of them at a time, only to see them die.  She came closest last year when one of the lobsters lived for seven months.

But this year, she believes she and McColl will become the proud godmothers of at least one spiny juvenile crustacean.  To ensure success, they have tried to create the perfect natural environment for the lobster larvae.  Webber created several aquarium habitats for the larvae based on where she has found juvenile lobsters in the ocean—in eel grass beds and among green and red algae.  She hopes to learn in which environment the young crustaceans feel most comfortable.

While Webber is overseeing the lobster habitats, McColl is in charge of feeding.  To check the lobster’s preferences, she is testing four feeds: larval grunion (a fish), fish eggs, brine shrimp and copepods.  Currently, Webber keeps most of her lobsters in individual Tupperware-like containers, but some are also combined in larger aquariums.

Every morning, McColl stops at the aquarium to clean and feed the 120 lobster tanks the pair is keeping.

Webber said the work is a childhood dream come true.  She grew up fishing for red rock shrimp on her father’s boat and has held on to her interest in crustaceans.  “For me, it’s a lifelong passion,” Webber said.  “My dad was a commercial fisherman in San Pedro.  I’ve loved fish ever since.  I never thought I’d be able to come to a facility and grow them—it’s incredible.”

If the two researchers don’t succeed with their current batch of larvae, they plan to spawn another lobster and try again.

Information: Cora Webber, Cabrillo Marine Aquarium, 3720 Stephen M. White Drive, San Pedro, California 90731, USA (phone 1-310-548-7562).

Source: Contra Costa Times.  Rock Lobster “Moms” Try to Make History in San Pedro.  Sandy Mazza (sandy.mazza@dailybreeze.com).  Photo: Robert Casillas. July 31, 2010.

Vietnam

Highest Shrimp Prices in Ten Years

As shrimp prices reached their highest level in ten years, driven by demand from the United States, shrimp has overtaken pangasius, a popular finfish, as Vietnam’s most valuable seafood export.  Shrimp exports in the first five months of the year topped $558 million, making it the country’s most valuable seafood export, said Vietnam’s Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development.  Shrimp prices soared nearly 40 percent to nearly $14 per kilo [size not given].

Source: Vietnam Association of Seafood Exporters and Producers (VASEP) Website. Vietnam: Prices Push Shrimp Top of Exports.  August 2, 2010.