Thursday | 16 January 2025 | Reg No- 06
বাংলা
   
Thursday | 16 January 2025 | Epaper

Crab cultivation suffers setback at Char Kukri Mukri

Published : Monday, 9 December, 2024 at 12:00 AM  Count : 124
Shipu Farazi
CHAR FASSON, BHOLA, Dec 8: Char Kukri Mukri is the Sagar Mohana Dwip of Bhola. The island is surrounded by rivers and seas. There is an embankment. Settlements are on one side of the embankment, and branch river and sea on the other side.

The source of income for the residents of this area is the fishing sector. Some of the people here are making a living by fishing in the branch river. After hilsa and shrimp, crab is now the valuable resource of fishermen in this region. So the people of Char are cultivating crabs in small enclosures in the yard of the house.

A lot has changed in the last four/five years. In the periphery of this area, crab cultivation is done as an additional income with little capital.  Although crab farming is done here in all seasons, the farming increases in these areas during the monsoon season.

Lack of employment in coastal areas, low labour and high profits have led many to join this lucrative profession. In the meantime, many are becoming self-sufficient by cultivating crabs. Those concerned believe that it is possible to earn foreign exchange by exporting crabs if they get patronage and help in processing.

Khalilur Rahman, a farmer of Char Kukri Mukuri, started crab farming a few years ago by constructing an enclosure on 15 acres of uncultivated land. During the winter season, he releases the baby crabs caught by the fishermen from the divers and mangrove forests of the estuary in the farm. Cuchila, rotten prawns and cuttlefish are used as food.
 
After only three months, it becomes a crab weighing 200 to 300 grams. They sell these crabs at the price of Tk 400 to 800 depending on their size. Many people of this town have been created employment in these small and big farms. Crab cultivation has become popular day by day in this region as it is more profitable with less investment, he maintained.

On the other hand, hundreds of thousands of families are making a living from river and sea crabs in Dhalchar, Char Patila, Manika and Kukri Mukri in the Bay of Bengal sub-region of the upazila. Due to the easy availability of crabs, many people have turned to this profession. 

Every day from dawn to dusk, hunters descend on dry canals, beels, rivers and mangroves to hunt crabs. Mangrove forests are the main breeding ground for crabs, one of the world's fisheries resources. 

The crabs extracted from here are exported to different countries of the world. But in the middle, because of the corona virus, the export of crabs has been stopped going abroad, out of which two to four of the shipments have been shipped, but the wholesalers have to count the losses.

Feroze Member, a crab farmer of Char Kukri area, said that he started crab cultivation in the pond with net  after receiving training in 2013 with the help of FDB organization. After only a few months, he earned a lot by selling crabs. "But now I don't get the price like before, the family can't survive with the price I get". 

Ismail Mistry, a crab hunter of Char Kachchapia area, said that four members of the family hunted crabs together. Every day he searched for crab holes in dried-up rivers and canals with an iron rod and caught crabs. 

The crabs sell well but the prices are not as high as before. So many crab hunters have left this profession.

Char Kukri crab traders said that earlier, where more than half a hundred baskets of crabs were exported from here, now not more than 5-10 baskets are being sent to Dhaka within a week. And if for any reason one of the consignments is returned then they are not available in the local market.

Sources at the Upazila Fisheries Department said that many families have become wealthy by selling all these crabs. As crab farming and hunting are profitable in this region, various local NGOs and Fisheries Department are mobilising farmers to cultivate crabs, by casting nets in coastal areas or canals to catch crabs. 

Some of the crab farmers are cultivating crab by digging ponds and taking loans from NGOs and various organizations.



LATEST NEWS
MOST READ
Also read
Man fined Tk 1.5 lakh for illegal hill cutting 
80 lakh people die annually due to tobacco consumption: Reports 
Road mishaps claim seven lives in six districts
Appeal for help! 
Carp fish cultivation creates revolution in Rajshahi 
3,850 cold-hit people get winter clothes in three districts
9 brick kilns fined Tk 28 lakh at Gurudaspur 
Three bodies recovered in B'baria, Manikganj 
Editor : Iqbal Sobhan Chowdhury
Published by the Editor on behalf of the Observer Ltd. from Globe Printers, 24/A, New Eskaton Road, Ramna, Dhaka.
Editorial, News and Commercial Offices : Aziz Bhaban (2nd floor), 93, Motijheel C/A, Dhaka-1000.
Phone: PABX- 41053001-06; Online: 41053014; Advertisement: 41053012.
E-mail: district@dailyobserverbd.com, news©dailyobserverbd.com, advertisement©dailyobserverbd.com, For Online Edition: mailobserverbd©gmail.com
🔝
close