Bhubaneswar Man Nets A Good Catch From Fish Farming In Tarpaulin Tanks

Bhubaneswar: Fish farming in tarpaulin water tank! Though sounds strange, a city-based man has made it possible.

Doing biofloc fish farming, businessman Manas Ranjan Choudhury has become a successful farmer. He started it after taking an online training.

During the training, he could know that it can be a profitable venture with very less investment. “I have land at my village in Bailasi Mouza in Cuttack district. Instead of going for fish farming in a pond, I thought of doing it in water tanks here,” said Manas.

“I started this farming seven months back, just before lockdown. I set up six tanks including two of 50,000 ltr capacity, two of 40,000 ltr, one of 20,000 ltr, one 15,000 ltr and one 8,000 ltr,” he said. He is producing different varieties of fish through biofloc farming.

It takes about six months for the fish to grow to marketable size and around seven ton of fish can be produced at a time, he said adding that he has earned a good profit in the first phase of farming. “With an investment of only Rs 18,000, one can get profit of more than Rs 36,000,” he added.

Now, Manas is not only a successful farmer in this field, but also trainer on the subject with more than 150 trainees.

“I had seen on internet that people outside India are doing fish farming in water tanks. Many people have started doing this in other states. Some people of Odisha have also started it,” he added.

On his interest in fish farming, Manas said, “Earlier, I was in security business. After taking the training, I calculated that if one will do this business in large scale, he can get good profit. There is less chance of failure in this farming. Because, investment and regular expenses are less. We have to just drain out some water and then add new water on regular basis. We have to give food to fish. There is nothing much to do.”

On his future plan, he said, “I want to do contract farming. I have planned to set up water tanks with live fish on some three-wheelers and sell those at different places so that people can have fresh fish.”