Hand Book on Aquafarming: Seaweed, Sea Urchin and Sea-Cucumber

Kaliaperumal, N and James, D B (1993) Hand Book on Aquafarming: Seaweed, Sea Urchin and Sea-Cucumber. Manual. MPEDA, Cochin.

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Abstract

SEAWEED CULTURE Seaweeds or marine algae are the primitive type of plants and they grow abundantly in the shallow water.; of sea, estuaries and backwater.;. They flourish wherever rocky, coral or suitable substrata are available for their attachment. They belong to fourgroups namely green, brown, red and blue-green algae based on the pigmentation, morphological and anatomical character.;. Seaweeds are one of the commercially important marine living and renewable resources of our country. They contain more than 60 trace elements, minerals, protein, iodine, bromine, vitamins and several bioactive substances. ------------------------- SEA URCHIN CULTURE Ripe Sea urchin eggs are considered as a delicacy by the Japanese and one kilogram of the same costs 200 U.S. Dollars. According to the FAD's annual statistics for 1984 approximately 54,000 tonnes of sea urchin eggs were harvested. Although it has excellent export potential very little information is published on the subject. James (1989) summerised all the information available on the industry. Although there are more than 50 species of sea urchins from the shallow waters of India there is no export of the eggs from this country. On the mainland of Ind ia and in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands and also in the Lakshadweep valuable species of sea urchins exist whose eggs can be exported profitably. There is an ever increasing demand for this product in theglobal markets. It is gratifying to note that in recent years the local export companies are evincing keen interest in this product and some of the Japanese have also come foronspot study of our resources. ------------------------------------ SEA CUCUMBER CULTURE According to the PAO's annual statistics for 1984 the world echinodenn harves t in 1983 amounted to approximately 80,000 tonnes. In 1989 India exported 51.5 tonnes of Beche-de-mer valued at Rs.1.23 crores. There is a growing demand for the Beche-de-mer from India. Some of the companies in Singapore are interested to import 10 tonnes every month. The echinoderms or spiny skinned animals such as the sea cucumbers and sea urchins have good commercial value. The most popular product is processed sea cucumber or Beche-de-mer, a Chinese d elicacy.

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