THE Department of Fisheries said last week that it will allocate K2 billion in loans to help five companies develop shrimp farms in Tanintharyi Division.

U Min Thame, a deputy director of the department’s shrimp farming section, said the project will be initiated on 250 acres at Myeik.

“We will start the project in Myeik with five shrimp farms of 50 acres each,” he said.

By 2006 the government plans to expand the project to a total of 15,000 acres of shrimp farms, with 8000 acres in Myeik, 4000 in Dawei and 3000 in Kawthoung, he said.

He said the department will adhere to sustainable aquaculture guidelines drafted by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation.

Shrimp farmers who participate in the project will have two years to pay back the loans at an annual interest rate of 16 per cent.

Establishing a 50-acre shrimp farm costs about K77 million.

U Min Thame said shrimp farms can produce two harvests a year.

Each company could expect to gross about K182 million from each harvest, he said.

Productions costs for each harvest were about K100 million, leaving a yearly profit of about K160 million.

He said the technologies, medicines and foods for the farms will be provided by the department and the Myanmar Prawn Entrepreneurs’ Association.

Meanwhile, the Department of Fisheries is planning to spend about K350 million to buy a machine that can test whether shrimp destined for export markets contain a banned antibiotic, the Minister for Livestock and Fisheries, Brigadier-General Maung Maung Thein, said earlier this month.

The minister announced the decision at a ceremony to mark the establishment of the Myanmar Prawn Entrepreneurs’ Association at the Yuzana Garden Hotel on May 4.

Brigadier-General Maung Maung Thein said being able to declare shrimp free of the presence of the antibiotic, Nitrofuran, would greatly assist efforts in increase exports.

The department banned Nitrofuran, and two other products, Chloramphenicol and Oxytetracycline, from use in animals produced for food since 2001, when they were also made subject to an import ban.

However, shipments of the antibiotic are believed to have entered the country illegally.

Most importing countries also ban shrimp containing the antibiotic.

The deputy director of the department’s shrimp farming section, U Min Thame, said bids for the supply of the testing machine had been invited from companies in Japan, Singapore and Thailand.

The machine will be installed at the department’s laboratory at Thaketa township which has equipment that can test for the presence of other antibiotics in shrimp.