Aquaculture
Cobia, Rachycentron canadum, is considered one of the most suitable candidates for warm, open-water marine fish aquaculture in the world. Their rapid growth rate in aquaculture, as well as the high quality of the flesh makes cobia potentially one of the most important marine fish for future aquaculture production.
Currently, cobia are being cultured in nurseries and grow-out offshore cages many parts of Asia and off the coast of US, Mexico and Panama. In Taiwan 100–600 g cobia are cultured for 1–1.5 years to reach 6–8 kg in size which is suitable for export to Japan. Currently, around 80% of marine cages in Taiwan are devoted to cobia culture. In 2004, FAO reported that 80.6% of the world’s cobia production was by primarily China and Taiwan.FAO After China and Taiwan, Vietnam is the third largest producer of farmed cobia in the world where production was estimated at 1500 tonnes in 2008. Following the success of cobia aquaculture in Taiwan, emerging technology is being used to demonstrate the viability of raising hatchery-reared cobia in collaboration with the private sector primarily using SeaStation™ and Aquapod™ submerged cages at exposed offshore sites in Puerto Rico and the Bahamas.
Greater depths, stronger currents and distance from shore all act to reduce environmental impacts often associated with fin fish aquaculture. Offshore cage systems could become some of the most environmentally sustainable methods for commercial marine fish aquaculture. However, some problems still exist in cobia culture that need to be addressed and solved for increasing production. These include high mortality due to stress during transport from nursery tanks or inshore cages out to grow-out cages, along with diseases during nursery and growout culture resulting in low survival, and consequently poor harvest.
Read more about this topic: Cobia