2023 2023 CGIAR Annual
Report

In Nigeria, CGIAR and partners established a breeding population of nutritious and fast-growing Genetically Improved Farmed Tilapia (GIFT), producing fish for distribution to hatcheries and farmers.

The government of Nigeria wants to boost sustainable aquaculture countrywide. In 2023, a breeding population of fast-growing GIFT was established in the country, successfully producing young fish for distribution to hatcheries and farmers. This achievement was the result of work by scientists at WorldFish in collaboration with the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security, Premium Aquaculture Ltd (PAL), and other national partners.

In 2023, scientists from the CGIAR Research Initiative on Aquatic Foods in Nigeria reached important milestones in supporting the establishment of an industry for GIFT in the country.

Fish are already critical to diets and the economy in Nigeria, but around 45 percent of demand is met through imports. With abundant inland water resources, there is significant scope to expand homegrown aquaculture and respond to the demands of a population expected to leap from 196 million to 260 million by 2030. While catfish accounts for more than 80 percent of aquaculture in the country, dependence on a single species is risky: disease could sweep through hatcheries and farms, wiping out stocks. In addition, signs of inbreeding in the country’s catfish populations have resulted in reduced growth and survival rates of the fish.

As part of the government’s five-year Agricultural Technology and Innovation Policy, launched in 2022, scientists from Aquatic Foods have been working on pioneering approaches to boost aquaculture. These aim to meet local protein needs, reduce imports, improve climate change resilience, empower the country’s smallholders, and create 500,000 new jobs in the aquaculture value chain.

Initiative scientists identified GIFT as being a good option for supporting these aims. GIFT is a strain of Nile tilapia that has benefited from multiple generations of selective breeding. It is fast growing, adaptable to a wide range of conditions, and — as an herbivore — its feed requirements are cheaper than other farmed fish, making it attractive to smallholders. GIFT also provides many of the same nutritional benefits as other fish, namely zinc, iron, Vitamin A, calcium, and protein.

In 2022, WorldFish teamed up with PAL, a hatchery and fish farm in Ogun State. As part of the partnership, 60,000 GIFT “swim-up fry” (very young fish) were packed into polythene bags with oxygenated water and flown from WorldFish headquarters in Malaysia to PAL, where they entered a mandatory month-long quarantine period. In 2023, the now-adult fish were used to produce a GIFT breeding population. The resulting progeny were supplied to farmers and hatcheries to establish their own production.

During 2023, onsite trials at the PAL hatchery involving local fish feed producer Premier Feed Mills showed that GIFT were performing well. Under different feeding regimes, they showed faster rates of growth and more efficient feed conversion than nonimproved fish already used by PAL. These should mean higher production, lower costs, and potentially more earnings for farmers.

The Initiative also supported the establishment of a breeding population at a PAL site in Ogun State and two small-scale hatcheries in Delta State, including pilot “grow-out” ponds for raising fish to market size. In November, PAL started supplying the second generation of GIFT fry to farmers.

“This is the best possible start for the introduction of GIFT in Nigeria,” said Sunil Siriwardena, of WorldFish, who leads the work of Aquatic Foods in the country. “At hatcheries, we’re seeing GIFT doing what they do best: resisting disease and quickly reaching a harvestable size, while the response from farmers has been overwhelmingly positive. We expect GIFT will be a huge asset in strengthening and expanding fish farming in Nigeria and supporting the government in achieving its aquaculture goals.”

In 2023, the Initiative produced a range of learning materials for hatcheries and farmers, including a handbook on BMPs for raising Nile tilapia. It also produced a curriculum on tilapia breeding, nursing, and grow-out farming, which was used to train around 200 farmers, approximately two-thirds of whom were women.

The work has a broader goal of decentralizing the production of GIFT seed to improve farmers’ access to it. A special focus is needed on boosting aquaculture in the northern region of the country, where fish farming and fish consumption is lower than in the south.

This is the best possible start for the introduction of GIFT in Nigeria. We expect GIFT will be a huge asset in strengthening and expanding fish farming in Nigeria and supporting the government in achieving its aquaculture goals. — Sunil Siriwardena, Officer-in-charge, WorldFish Nigeria