1.0 NATIONAL FISH PRODUCTION The fisheries sector in Tanzania plays a significant role in social and economic development by contributing to employment creation, revenue generation and food security – all of which are crucial for the attainment of the Millennium Development Goals. The Tanzanian fishery is mainly artisanal with very few commercial/industrial vessels of purse seines and long liners owned by Distant Water Fishing Nations (DWFN), which operate under licensing agreements in our Economic Exclusive Zone (EEZ) targeting Tuna and Tuna like species. The artisanal fishery accounts for almost all the inland and marine water catches and consequently it is currently the most important fishery in the country. In order to evaluate the contribution of the Fisheries Sector to the country’s economy and subsequently to the National GDP, The Fisheries Sector under the Ministry of Livestock and Fisheries Development collects fisheries information annually by involving key stakeholders including Central Government authorities, local government authorities, fishing communities and NGOs. Collection of fisheries information requires both scientific methodologies including application of standardized data collection protocols, processing and dissemination of information to the relevant stakeholders. This document provides performance of Fisheries Sector in the Country for the year 2013. The Sector supported a total of 202,654 people directly as fishers/farmers deriving their livelihood from various fishery resources in the country. Out of this number, 19,223 were fish farmers while 183,223 were fishers. The sector supports more than 4 million people engaged in related fisheries activities to include, processing, trading, fish transporting, net making and boat building. Fish production and value in the Country have indicated oscillating increased trend over the recent past years with the highest quantity of 375,534.6 metric tons of fish landed in 2005 (Figure 1). The contribution of the sector has been estimated at 1.4 % to the national Gross Domestic Product (GDP). Under the year of review fish production was 367,854 metric tons valued at Tshs. 1,444,432,520 (Table 1), during the same period, the country earned over 6,117,769,193.74US $ million as foreign exchange from export of fish and fishery products.
1.1 FISHING EFFORT About 183,223 fishers and 57,037 fishing vessels were recorded in 2013, since 2005 there has been a steady increase in the number of fishers, fishing vessels and landing sites in all water bodies (Table 2). The highest number of fishers and fishing vessels are found in Lake Victoria (101,250 fishers and 28,470 fishing vessels), others are Marine (36,321 fishers and 7,664 fishing vessels), Lake Tanganyika (26,612 fishers and 11,506 fishing vessels), Lake Nyasa (5,550 fishers and 2,632 fishing vessels), Lake Rukwa (3,428 fishers and 1,786 fishing vessels), Mtera dam (2,369 fishers and 1,238 fishing vessels ), Nyumba ya mungu dam (786 fishers and 502 fishing vessels) and Minor water (6,907 fishers and 3,239 fishing vessels) (Table 3).
1.2: FISH CONSUMPTION Fish and fishery products represent a very valuable source of protein and essential micronutrients for balanced nutrition and good health. Fish contributes to the world population’s intake of animal protein. Globally, fish provides about 3.0 billion people with almost 20 % of their intake of animal protein, and 4.3 billion people with about 15 % of such protein (FAO Statistics Year book 2010). In 2013 per capita consumption was estimated about 7.7 kg/capita (Table 5). Table 5: Estimated Fish Consumption from 2010-2013 Category 2010 2011 2012 2013 Population size 40,000,000.0 40,000,000.0 44,929,002.0 44,929,002.0 Imports of fish/fish products for direct human consumption(kg) 2,759,772.0 3,216,671.0 4,885,689.0 6,642,398.0 National fisheries production(kg) (capture production) 347,156,950.0 341,065,980.0 365,023,000.0 367,854,000.0 Aquaculture production (Tilapia &others) 222,000.0 3,628,500.0 2,977,500.0 Export of fish/fish production in kg 39,771,833.7 37,996,4 41,394,267.9 38,573,600.0 National fish consumption (kg) 310,144,888.3 306,228,217.7 332,142,921.1 338,900,298.0 Per capital fish consumption (kg) 7.8 7.7 7.57 7.7 1.3 FISHERIES POTENTIAL It has been estimated that the country has the potential of harvesting about 2,537,444 metric tons of fish from its traditional sources of Lakes Victoria, Tanganyika, Nyasa, Rivers, Dams and the inshore marine waters (Table 7). The estimate covers only the freshwater and territorial waters (Table 6). (Source TAFIRI)
1.4: MAIN FISH SPECIES Tanzanian fishery is dominated by multi-species, however, only a few species dominates landings in terms of volume (Table 8.). The most notable species are; Nile perch (Lates niloticus), Tilapia (Oreochromis niloticus) and Lake sardine locally known as “dagaa” Rastrineobola argentea from Lake Victoria. Species from Lake Tanganyika fisheries includes lake sardines (dagaa) Stolothrissa tanganicae and Limnothrissa miodon together with their predators the L. Stappersii, L. Marie and L. microlepis. On the other hand, Lake Nyasa has good stocks of various species of Tilapia, Haplochromis spp and Lake sardines Engraulicypris sardella. Marine fisheries resources also contribute to the total annual catch, the main commercial marine species are sardine and anchovy, which together forms 30 - 50 percent of the total fish landing. Other fish species being landed include; Lethrinus rhodopterus (changu), Carrotomus spinidens (pono), Caranx cynodon (kolekole), Siganus oramin (Tasi), Tuna (jodari), Scomberomorus plurilineatus Kingfish (nguru), Restrelliger chrysozonus (Vibua), Carcharinus falciformis (papa), Hypolophussephen (taa), Panulirus ornatus (kamba kochi), Penaeus bubulus (kamba) Anchoviella commersonii (dagaa) and Octopus chromatus (Pweza) ( Table 9)
7.0 AQUACULTURE PRODUCTION Aquaculture production specifically refers to output from aquaculture activities, which are designated for final harvest for local consumption and export. Output is reported in weight (generally in tones of live weight equivalent for aquatic animals, in wet weight for aquatic plants). Aquaculture production is reported by two culture environments: freshwater and marine water. By freshwater is meant waters with a consistently negligible salinity, by marine is meant coastal and offshore waters in which the salinity is maximal and not subject to significant daily and seasonal variation. Aquaculture production in Tanzania is small scale (mixed sex) generally with 3 fingerlings per square meter stocking density, the average area of fish pond is 300m² (15m x 20m). From 2012-2013 the estimated number of farmers for freshwater were 17,726 while in marine water there are 1,306 farmers for milk fish, 51 farmers for prawn, 188 farmers for crabs 98 farmers for pearl culture and 2,826 farmers for sea weed farmers. Table 37: Aquaculture production for 2013
