About 5.75 lakh tonnes of hilsa are expected this season from a 70-kilometre stretch of the Meghna running from Matlab Uttar upazila in Chandpur to Char Bhairabi in Haimchar upazila. Researchers say the outlook is based on more than 51 per cent of mother hilsa in the area having been able to spawn undisturbed during the breeding season.

According to the local fisheries department, the Ministry of Fisheries and Livestock banned hilsa fishing on the 70-km stretch from 4 to 25 October to protect breeding. Selling, transporting, marketing, storing and stockpiling hilsa were also banned.

Anisur Rahman, chief scientific officer and hilsa researcher at the fisheries research institute in Chandpur, told Prothom Alo by mobile phone that 51.2 per cent of mother hilsa spawned in the Chandpur area of the Meghna between 4 and 25 October last year, and 5.5 lakh tonnes of hilsa were produced in the area. This time, he said, large numbers of mother hilsa spawned undisturbed across the district's stretch of the Meghna during the 22 days. Breeding was somewhat lower around the new moon in early October, but shoals of mother hilsa completed safe breeding around the full moon, and he believes more fish spawned than last time.

He said production is likely to exceed last year's quantity and numbers, with about 5.75 lakh tonnes possible in the district this year.

Asked whether the roe-laden hilsa reaching markets in the five days since the ban ended would affect production, he said hilsa spawn to some extent all year round, most heavily in the breeding season around the October new and full moons, and some can spawn before and after. "This is normal," he said, adding that it would not significantly affect expected production, just as it had not last year.

Monowara Begum, fisheries officer of Matlab Uttar upazila, said 44 drives were carried out on the Meghna between 4 and 25 October to ensure breeding. About 27 lakh metres of current nets and about four maunds of hilsa were seized and many fishers fined. She said the drive to protect mother hilsa was largely successful and breeding went undisturbed, so more hilsa would be found in the Meghna than last year.

Source: Staff Correspondent. First published in Bengali on The Agro News.