Proper management of the fisheries sector is indispensable for the sustainable aquatic food production in line with harvesting, transportation, processing and preservation, marketing, cool chain and manufacture of value-added wet fish products. These are parallelly engaged with the food security and safety, nutrition and livelihood of the beneficiaries associated with thefisheries resources. For this, it is necessary to have the sincere goodwill, cooperation and joint efforts of all the beneficiaries and related departments, national, international and private organizations.
Fish is one of the healthiest food items on the planet. Bangladesh is currently self-sufficient in fish production. As fish production is increasing year after year, there is need to add value through the fabrication of value-added fish products from small fishes, pangas, tilapia, rui, katla,etc.
By adding value to the wet fish, local farmer’s/producers can add profit from their investment. Anyone can be involved along with or apart from the job. Two major losses of fish in our country are generally recognized, namely qualitative and quantitative losses. These losses can be reduced to a great extent by proper handling and value addition of fish after harvest. If we can reduce huge losses of fish through cool chain technology and produce value in wet fish then the country’s food and nutrition needs will be met to a great extent. We are earning foreign currencies by adding value to raw/wet fishes and this initiative can increase more.
Wet fish can be value-added in various ways. Dressed fish products (Ready-to-Cook) are called one type of value-added product. The demand for this product is huge in the foreign countries. In Bangladesh, it has not spread much upto we need and generally, these products are manufactured based on the needs of the consumers. Nowadays people want to save time, following that we can find fish cutters in every fish market, this is also a valuable addition. Fish cutters engaging themselves as one of the important part/indicator in fish value chain, growing popularity and the demand is increasing.
They set the price according to the fish size and type. Like 1 kg rui or any carp species will take 10-15 Taka, using sharp weighted knife and process in several chunks within 3-5 minutes and in case of small fishes they will charge more. They are busy according to the number of customers and the amount of fish they bought to process. They will not ask you how many chunks you need from an individual fish, so before cutting the fish you have to share your thought what you want or how many you need, if you don’t they will do according to their default system. Specially they are saving the time, workload, producing fishery by-products and opened a new walk of life. Like someone can buy fish, dress, packaged and freeze and sell it in different sizes and weights.
Dressed fish products are usually found in fish processing industries. Anyone can make those at home or insert it into their small business. These products are boneless fish, skinned fish, fish steaks, fish chunks (the way fish is usually cut for culinary in our country), fish loins, fish fillets, beheaded fish, gutted fish, scaled fish, chopped fish, etc.In other words, fish can be added value by removing viscera, ribs, scales, fins, etc.
As fish is the most perishable food item so, cool chains like freezing, icing and refrigeration should be maintained during keeping quality of wet fish products or selling in the future. All these above-mentioned products are called ready-to-cook products. We can find those products in very few quantities in the super shop like Swapno, Mina Bazar,Agoda, etc.
For large business operators, avalue-added Fish App can be developed to find out the desired products for the consumer, where the detailed specification of the dressed fish will be mentioned, like premium quality fish steak with size, quantity and weight, origin of fish, harvest and expire date etc. andsubsequentlysaves time in the consumer’s hand. Some business operators are already working but those are very scanty in Bangladesh.
We know how a digital food app works today. Even entrepreneurs can start from small two or three grocery shops where the freezer is already available, he can add some visibility through posters or banners or in social media, for example,tagging “Premium quality dressed Haorskachki or Puti fish are available for ready-to-cook”. This will bring profit for the small entrepreneur, in addition to saving time for the consumer because he did not need to cut fish it accordingly at home and new job opportunities will be opened for the small or large scale fish processor.