Damascus - Director General of the General Establishment of Fisheries, Mohammed Zein-Eddin, said the establishment is seeking financing for a project on conducting a precise and practical estimate of sea resources particularly the ground fish living near the bottom of the sea.
He added the project is likely to take about three years to get the real numbers of the fish resources given the many changes that happened since the last estimate of 1978, conducted by a Korean mission.
Zein-Eddin pointed out in a statement to SANA that the Establishment is working on a new project on fish farming, the first of its kind in Syria.
He added that the experience is still new, as it was launched in November 2010, and takes one year to be ready to enter production phase.
The project covers an area of 10,000 m2, with an estimated production of 100 tons per year. It aims at producing new kinds of fish; sparus auratus and ide (leuciscus idus), which have never been available in Syria.
Zein-Eddin attributed the low production of fish to the nature of the Syrian Coast which extends over just 183 km, characterized by a narrow continental shelf and to a 1000 meter deep collapse, in addition to the other problems related to overfishing and the use of prohibited fishing techniques.
Director of the fish farms at the estuary of al-Sin river, Thaer Said, pointed out that these farms are specialized in producing popular freshwater fish such as the carp and T.aurea.
He said the process of fish production in fish farming includes two stages. The first is hatchery, which begins in April and lasts for seven months. Then comes the stage of fish fry and fingerlings before the storage process begins, which lasts till the beginning of spring season. After that the fish are transferred to fattening ponds for 6 months to be ready for consumption.
© SANA (Syria Arab News Agency) 2011
