WWW.WAS.ORG • WORLD AQUACULTURE • JUNE 2017 51 (CONTINUED ON PAGE 52) Farmers and collectors think that they do not get a fair price because the marketing system is fully controlled by intermediaries. They expect that government should regulate this business and establish appropriate strategies like an open marketing structure with grade-wise specific price for the well-being of farmers as well crab fishery development. The crab sector has generated different livelihood options for the coastal poor and marginalized household members, who were mostly non-wage labor before. A number of people are engaged in many ways, including making enclosures (Fig. 7), traps, baskets and fishing tackle, collecting and selling trash fish, snails (Fig. 8), and other low-value fish from open sources of freshwater and saline water. Besides these, selling nets, medicines, lime, string, and crab feeds (maize and wheat). Depot owners and suppliers also employ many young men paid wages to purchase, check, grade and package crabs. Crab fishery creates extra employment opportunities because it requires transportation from farms to local buyers to secondary markets (Fig. 9) and finally to export market. Some landless and marginally poor people have found the crab value chain to be an alternative earning source for better livelihood. Loading and unloading crabs provides jobs too (Fig. 10). Women’s Empowerment and Socio-economic Mobilization There has been an opportunity to involve more women in crab farming activities. In southwestern coastal Bangladesh, 74 percent of crab fatteners are women. In the farming system, women participate in many activities such as collect crab feeds (snails, low-value fish) and mince and apply to ponds; prepare lime and fertilizers and sometimes apply them; harvest, wash and tie crabs and sell to local buyers. Women will purchase rejected crabs (damaged, underweight with developed gonad, immaturely developed gonad) from depots of secondary markets and sell to domestic markets (Fig. 11). Some women purchase different sorts of trash-fish or other low-value fish from markets, collectors, fish farmers, gher owners and then chop in small pieces as well as sell to fatteners as crab feed (Fig. 12). This sector appeals to achieve the sustainable and substantial improvements of women life as well as to address the gender disparities in access to and control over resources and decision making. Involvement of women in crab aquaculture allows men to work outside, thereby reducing family vulnerability. There is a paradigm shift in the way that coastal people think about their livelihoods as they shift from shrimp farming to crab farming in response to changing climate. Crab farming serves as a hedge against poverty and provides access to market, food, health services and education. Furthermore, the mud crab sector is driving social interactions by involving all coastal people. It is offering a mirthful environment to vulnerable and poverty-stricken people. Most importantly, crab fishery is offering alternative livelihoods to help vulnerable littoral communities be resilient to changing climate conditions in coastal Bangladesh. Constraints and Challenges All types of mud crab farming depend on the natural seed supply because no hatchery-raised quality seed production has been established in Bangladesh. A lack of technical knowledge of hatchery technology and farming systems and lack of entrepreneurship and investment are the major constraints on the development of successful mud crab farming in Bangladesh. The government and other relevant FIGURE 10. Loading a truck for transporting mud crabs to an export market in Debhata, Satkhira, Bangladesh. Photo: Md. Mojibar Rahman. FIGURE 12. Women selling minced fish as crab feed in Rampal, Bagerhat, Bangladesh. Photo: Md. Mojibar Rahman. FIGURE 11. A woman selling mud crabs at a market in Batiaghata, Khulna, Bangladesh. Photo: Md. Mojibar Rahman.
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