Fisheries Situation Report, July to September 2020

Fisheries

During the third quarter of 2020, the total volume of fisheries production was estimated at 1,016.67 thousand metric tons. It posted an increase of 2.9 percent from the previous year’s same quarter output of 987.74 thousand metric tons. Among the fisheries subsectors, improvements were traced from both commercial and municipal fisheries while aquaculture displayed decrement during the period.

Of the 20 major species, double digit increments in production were noted in bigeye tuna (tambakol/bariles, 39.9%), bali sardinella (tamban, 31.5%), blue crab (alimasag, 25.6%), cavalla (talakitok, 18.9%), yellowfin tuna (tambakol/bariles, 16.1%), frigate tuna (tulingan, 13.6%) and roundscad (galunggong, 12.9%).

On the other hand, decreases in production were primarily displayed by fimbriated sardines (tunsoy, -21.8%), tiger prawn (sugpo, -11.3%) and mudcrab (alimango, -9.7%).

Commercial

Commercial fisheries volume of production this quarter went up to 255.16 thousand metric tons or by 11.5 percent, from 228.79 thousand metric tons in the same period a year ago. The subsector comprised 25.1 percent of the total fisheries production.

Municipal

For municipal fisheries, a 6.0 percent output increment was noted. The volume of production during the quarter was reported at 280.83 thousand metric tons from the 264.85 thousand metric tons in the same period a year ago. Of this volume of production, 85.9 percent came from unloadings from marine municipal landing centers while the rest were caught from inland bodies of water. Municipal fisheries shared 27.6 percent to the total fisheries production.

Aquaculture

The volume of harvests from aquaculture farms went down by -2.7 percent. The output was posted at 480.67 thousand metric tons during the period from the 494.10 thousand metric tons in the same period of the previous year. The share of aquaculture subsector to the total fisheries was 47.3 percent.