LiVelihood ProspectS of BELLAMYA BENGALENSIS, Its proximate protein and amino acid composition and culture in captive condition

Fresh water molluscs have latent potential mainly from the industrial point of view.  These aquatic animal groups have several industrial and marketing opportunities for socio-economic upliftment of the resource-poor of the West Midnapore District of West Bengal, India. About 70%-85% Schedule Caste (socially and financially backward communities of India) people are engaged in marketing of edible molluscs, mainly Bellamya bengalensis, Pila globosa and Lamellidens marginalis. They collect about 1-3 tons per day and sell at Rs. 50/- to Rs. 150/- (whole sale). Every day, 70kg to 100 kg molluscs  are being sold by each retail sellers @ Rs. 80/- to Rs. 100/- in the market. Livelihood study has been done on people of two Villages who are engaged in this profession; Debra Block named "Pakui" and "Chowksahapore". Bellamya bengalensis is successfully cultured & reproduced in our laboratory in captive condition. Manured earthen pots have been used and snails are fed with leaves in different quantities and they breed in captive condition. It provides very cheap, digestible protein to the poor society. An experiment was conducted to know about its qualitative and quantitative composition of Protein and Amino acid. Protein estimation of an adult snail was carried out using Kjeldhal's method and amino acid profile was analysed using HPLC. High protein content (48.65 ± 0.85 % (d/w))  and essential amino acid content (63.45 ± 0.68%) was observed in the meat. Comparing our result with WHO's research publication, it was observed that, a few grammes of  Bellamya bengalensis contain the amount of Protein and essential amino acid which are essential for a person per day. These experiments proved that Bellamya bengalensis contains enormous source of nutrition at a very cheap rate, comparing to the finfish and red meat group, and that's why many poor people depend directly on B. bengalensis as their main life source (earning and edible). They also believe in its ethno-medicinal importance. Unfortunately, the Gastropod culture is still in infancy in India. It may be noted that this fresh water molluscan group can create a good entrepreneurship development among rural poor. It is a fact that spending less money, less time, less space, less labour and  taking almost zero risk, a handsome output can be obtained from this sector. Many countries have developed good infrastructure and management protocols in this sector, whereas India is lagging behind. At present, shell fishes are harvested from nature but in future, culture practices will have to be developed for ensuring a steady and improved supply of this protein source to the population and it can be assumed  that day may not  be too far.