Deputy Prime Minister Hoang Trung Hai has asked commercial banks to provide capital to seafood processors so that they can buy material fish from farmers. Still farmers cannot find buyers for their fish. Although Hai had meeting with leaders of eight Cuu Long River Delta provinces, and asked them to take necessary measures to help farmers sell fish. The Deputy Prime Minister made the request on giving loans to seafood processors after farmers sent a petition to the government, crying for help.
The farmers said in the petition that the processing companies refused to buy fish because they could not arrange enough money. It is said that the farmers are losing VND1mil for every tonne of fish. The bigger the ponds of fish are the bigger the losses farmers will suffer. Phan Tan Ket, a fish farmer in Lap Vo district in Dong Thap province, said that it is good to know that the Deputy Prime Minister had asked banks to give loans to seafood processors. We have been entreating processors to buy our fish, but they shake their heads.
Vo Van Doi, Director of Can Tho Department for Agriculture and Rural Development, informed that there are some 50,000 tonnes of tra and basa fish left unsold among the local farmers. According to the An Giang Agriculture and Rural Development, the province will have some 70,000 tonnes of tra and basa fish by the end of the third quarter of the year.
