Fish farming

The Fazendas Reunidas Vale do Juliana is a business committed to both high productivity and environmental protection and social justice. Fish farming represents one of its greatest projects, with production capacity of up to 12 million hatchings per year, as well as 1,650 tons tilapias per year produced from its installed water potential. This totals 25 aquaculture units with the capacity of developing technology for the creation of fish with exporting quality. Get to know a little more about how fish farming reflects another example of the high reputation of the products that carry the quality brand of Fazendas Reunidas Vale do Juliana.

Net ponds: a reasonable alternative

Fish farming in net ponds is a technological alternative to intensive breeding that uses the resources of lakes, ponds, streams, rivers and dams. The net ponds are structures built with screens or nets enclosed from all sides that, similar to a tank, circulate water. One of the greatest advantages of the net pond is the continuous water circulation, which allows waste to be removed by constantly cycling in oxygen.

The environment is structured as a type of box, which is made from a screen being placed on top of a water surface. From there, animals develop in separate compartments beginning with their hatching phase to the final fishing stage. This breeding system has been expanding all over Brazil, gaining popularity among different rural producers in different regions of the country.

Here are a few of the many advantages that this farming technique provides:
• Lower initial investment when compared to the construction of traditional breeding cages and raceways, and so, it is affordable to the family producers;
• Allows the usage of pre-existing reservoirs, where traditional fish farming would be impossible;
• Reduces flavor discrepancies in fish;
• There is the possibility of controlling egg laying in the case of tilapias;
• The control of the food dispense is higher, through the use of feeders, which means there is less food waste;
• Fish are easier to catch in their fishing phase;
• Allows for the optimization of the use of water, with the greatest economy;
• Optimizes the use of food, improving food conversion;
• Facilitates the observation and management of the fish stocks;
• It can be applied in waters where the fish production is small or where the fishing is difficult;
• In the choice of a place for the installation of net ponds, the following factors should be noted:
• Environmental factors (such as water quality, geographical, weather and biological aspects);
• Structural factors (access, communication, safety, labor and market conditions);
• Social-economic factors (level of organization in the community, use of the reservoir, family income composition, labor and land situations)
• Legal factors (the legislation for water use)
• The kind of cultivation that is most recommended are the Nile tilapias or Thailand type, which have characteristics that lead them to have the best growth in this form of cultivation.

It is worth mentioning that these specific qualities make tilapias one of the fish with the greatest potential for fish farming:

1. They feed on basic items in the food chain
2. They accept a great variety of food, even those that do not convert in meat;
3. They respond with the same efficiency to the ingestion of protein of vegetable or animal origin.