COMPARISON OF A ZERO FISH MEAL FORMULATED FEED, A U.S. SOY-OPTIMIZED FORMULATED FEED WITH THREE PERCENT FISH MEAL AND COMMERCIAL FEED USING THE U.S. SOYBEAN EXPORT COUNCIL'S MARKETING PROGRAM'S LOW VOLUME, HIGH DENSITY CAGE AQUACULTURE TECHNOLOGIES WITH TILAPIA Oreochromis niloticus IN A COMMERCIAL PHILIPPINE TILAPIA CAGE FARM ON TAAL LAKE

Levy Loreto L. Manalac*, Mark W. Newman and Lukas Manomaitis
 
United States Soybean Export Council (USSEC)
Singapore Representative Office
541 Orchard Road
#11-03 Liat Towers
Singapore  238881
www.soyaqua.org
lmanalac@ct.ussec.org  

The U.S. Soybean Export Council's (USSEC) Soy-In-Aquaculture (SIA) Program conducted a comparative feed demonstration project using U.S. soy products with tilapia (Oreochromis niloticus) on a commercial farm in Taal Lake, Batangas, Philippines using the USSEC Low Volume High Density (LVHD) cage culture production methodology.

The objective of this feeding demonstration was to evaluate the growth performance and economic return of tilapia cultured from fingerling to market stages in cages using three diets; a zero fishmeal diet formulated by USSEC, a U.S. soy optimized diet formulated by USSEC with 3% fishmeal and a commercial diet produced by Southeast Feeds Corp. All production cages were managed using the USSEC LVHD cage culture methodology.

The demonstration project used 15 units of 3x3x3 m (27m3) steel floating cages that targeted a final biomass of 30kg/m3 (810kg/cage) of tilapia. Five cages used the zero fishmeal tilapia formulated diet, five used a U.S. soy optimized formulated diet with 3% fishmeal and five used commercially available feeds. The tilapia using the USSEC formulated feeds targeted a 32% crude protein, 6% crude lipid (32/6) extruded, floating tilapia feed. The tilapia using the commercially available feeds targeted a 33% crude protein, 5% crude lipid (33/5) extruded, floating tilapia feed.

Tilapia were stocked at an average size of 42g and a stocking rate of 3,240 fish per cage.  After 88 days of culture the fish fed with the USSEC zero fishmeal formulated diet had a biomass of 643kg or 23.8kg/m³ with average body weight (ABW) of 319g, FCR of 1.53 and survival rate of 62.4%, while fish fed with the USSEC U.S. soy optimized formulated diet with 3% fishmeal had a biomass of 664kg or 24.6kg/m³ with ABW of 325g, FCR of 1.47 and survival rate of 63.4% and the fish fed with the commercial feed had a biomass of 682kg or 25.6kg/m³ with ABW of 339g, FCR of 1.46 and survival rate of 62.0%.

Based on cost per unit gain (cost of feed to produce a kilo of fish) it showed that the tilapia fed with the USSEC zero fishmeal formulated diet has a cost of US$ 0.995/kg, while the tilapia fed with the USSEC U.S. soy optimized formulated diet with 3% fishmeal has a cost of US$ 0.993/kg and the tilapia fed with the commercial feed has a cost of US$ 1.050/kg.