Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development: Analysis of Technical, Economic and Social Indicators and Assessment of Technical Adoption Rate in Clam Aquaculture Households - MS10 " pot

Part one was used to collect information on clam culture pond households with seven subsections indicating pond selection criteria; pond cleaning; seed selection and stocking; algal prod

Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development

COLLABORATION FOR AGRICULTURE AND RURAL DEVELOPMENT (CARD)

027/05 VIE project Development of clam culture for improvement and diversification of livelihoods of the

poor coastal communities in Central Vietnam

MS 10: Project Validation Report Analysis of Technical, Economic and Social

Indicators and Assessment of Technical Adoption

Rate in Clam Aquaculture Households

1

Center for Aquaculture Engineering and Technology Transfer

Dinh Bang - Tu Son - Bac Ninh, Vietnam

2 Aquaculture Research Sub Institute for North Central Vietnam

Cua Lo - Nghe An, Vietnam

3

South Australia Research and Development Institute

PO Box 120, Henley Beach, South Australia 5022

4 March 2010

Table of Contents

List of tables 3

List of figures 4

Acknowledgment 4

I INTRODUCTION 4

1.1 Introduction 4

1.2 Objective of this study 5

1.2.1 General objective 5

1.2.2 Specific objectives 5

II STUDY METHODOLOGY 6

2.1 Study location 6

2.2 Data collection 6

2.3 Data analysis 7

III RESULT AND DISCUSION 7

3.1 Household information 7

3.1.1 Information of respondent 7

3.1.2 Information of household 8

3.2 Clam culture activities 12

3.2.1 Clam culture technical indicators 12

3.2.2 Clam culture economic indicator 17

3.3 Factors influencing and being influenced by clam culture 24

3.3.1 Social impact of clam culture development 24

3.3.2 Influence of clam culture development on other production activities 25

3.3.3 Influence of other activities on clam culture production 25

3.3.4 Effect of clam culture on the environment 26

3.3.5 Effect from the environment on clam culture 26

3.3.6 Constraints to clam culture development 27

3.4 Technical adoption rate of trained households of pond clam culture 28

3.4.1 Pond selection 28

3.4.2 Pond preparation 29

3.4.3 Seed stocking 29

3.4.4 Algal production (live feed) and pond management 30

3.4.5 Harvesting and preservations 30

3.5 Technical adoption rate of trained farmers of inter-tidal clam culture 31

3.5.1 Site selection 31

3.5.2 Site preparation 31

3.5.3 Seed stocking 32

3.5.4 Monitoring and management 33

3.5.6 Harvesting and preservations 33

5 PROJECT IMPACT 34

6 CONCLUSION 36

7 RECOMMENDATIONS 36

8 REFERENCES 37

Appendix A: 38

Appendix B: 42

Appendix C 45

List of tables

Table 1: Age, gender and education information of survey respondent in the project site 8

Table 2: Household size and gender of household member in the study provinces 8

Table 3: Labor force of clam culture farm and labor involve in clam aquaculture 9

Table 4: Information on household occupation in the study area 10

Table 5: Clam aquaculture experience of household in the project area 10

Table 6: Clam culture technical training, quality and rate of applying in the study area 11

Table 7: Type and area of land holding of farmers in the study region 12

Table 8: Land used in clam aquaculture and water sources status in the research provinces 12 Table 9: Clam aquaculture area of clam farmers and tidal effect depth in the region 13

Table 10: Clam seed sources of household in the study provinces 14

Table 11: Seed stocking size and stocking density 15

Table 12: Harvesting size and productivity of clam culture 16

Table 13: Clam selling type and clam for family consumption 16

Table 14: Cost of area repair, fencing and watch tower, casting/stocking, watch/guard from pouching, and land tax/fee 18

Table 15: Seed, fertilizer and lime costs of clam culture in the project provinces 19

Table 16: Hire labor and harvesting costs 20

Table 17: Total cost, total income, benefit and benefit-cost ratio of clam farms 22

Table 18: Capital sources, amount of borrowed capital and interest rate 22

Table 19: Household income sources of farmers in the study area 23

Table 20: The social impact of clam aquaculture development (%) 24

Table 21: Influence of clam aquaculture development on other production activities (%) 25

Table 22: Influence of other activities on clam aquaculture production (%) 26

Table 23: The effect of clam aquaculture on the environment (%) 26

Table 24: The effect from the environment on clam aquaculture (%) 27

Table 25: Constraints to clam aquaculture development (%) 28

Table 26: Adoption rate of pond clam farmers on pond selection parameters 29

Table 27: Adoption rate of pond clam farmers on pond preparation parameters 29

Table 28: Adoption rate of pond clam farmers on seed stocking parameters 29

Table 29: Adoption rate of pond clam farmers on algal production and clam pond management parameters 30

Table 30: Adoption rate of tidal clam farmers on tidal site selection parameters 31

Table 31: Adoption rate of tidal clam farmers on tidal preparation parameters 32

Table 32: Adoption rate of tidal clam farmers on seed stocking parameters 32

Table 33: Adoption rate of tidal clam farmers on tidal area monitoring and management 33

Table 34: Adoption rate of tidal clam farmers on harvesting and product preservation 34

List of figures

Figure 1: Vietnamese provincial map indicating the location of the six project provinces 6

Figure 2: Diagram of clam seed marketing channel 14

Figure 3: Diagram of clam marketing channel in the study area 17

Figure 4: Diagram indicating rate of input contribution of tidal clam culture 20

Figure 5: Diagram indicating rate of input contribution of pond clam culture 20

Acknowledgment

Authors would like to thank the following organizations and persons helped the research team during study conducted:

• Collaboration for Agriculture and Rural Development (CARD), which supported financial for this study

• The Aquaculture Departments and the Agriculture and Fisheries Extension Centers

of Thanh Hoa, Nghe An, Ha Tinh, Quang Binh, Quang Tri and Thua Thien Hue provinces, which provided the secondary data for this research

• The clam demonstration farms and the clam culture households in the project provinces who are respondents of the survey, who were supplied the data for this study

I INTRODUCTION

1.1 Introduction

Vietnam’s fisheries sector has grown rapidly over the last 20 years since the adoption of the

innovation age in the late 1980’s which implemented market oriented reforms Foreign

investment and trade liberalisation facilitated an eight-fold increase in the volume of exports

of fisheries products between 1990 and 2002, which was supported by changes in policies and attitudes towards the private sector and reforms in the management and operations of state enterprises (Dung 2003) In 2002, fisheries was Vietnam’s third largest sector in terms

of total export revenue at just over US$2 billion – a 13% increase from the previous year and contributing 11% of Vietnam’s national export earnings (MoFI 2003) It is estimated that 3.4 million people (approximately 4% of the population) derive their income directly from aquaculture and capture fisheries (MoFI 2006) However, the total number of people whose livelihood is dependent on the fisheries and other aquatic resources for subsistence is larger Aquaculture has grown rapidly in Vietnam in the past two decades and contributing for greater than 40% in volume of total seafood export Aquaculture in Vietnam is generally performed as family-scale operations characterized by low-input use and requirements (Dung 2003) Growth in export value and diversification is having a positive and stabilizing effect

on Vietnamese households, especially in terms of employment, income and skills growth However, due to disease outbreak resulting from a consequence of water deterioration, especially in the shrimp farming system, this is resulting in a reduction in aquaculture production In this context, a trend to diversity culture species needs to be considered Expansion and diversification of culture system areas can surely boost production and market value This re-enforces the Vietnamese government’s plan for a total production of 50,000 tones of mollusk to be produced annually by the year 2010 (MoFI master plan, 2006)

Mollusk is a promising activity as it has a high total value despite a low production rate Clam culture being the most profitable consideration However, clam culture has the disadvantage that it relies mainly on the capture of seed from nature Seed production and integration culture systems have been poorly investigated Currently, farmers are making total use of a flat tidal zone for clam culture In some north and central provinces, stocking of hard clam seed in shallow inshore waters has provided a low cost alternative income to the poor fisher households Under the financial support from Vietnamese government and Australian Agency for International Development, a project titled “Development of clam culture for improvement and diversification of livelihoods of the poor coastal communities in Central Vietnam” was jointly undertaken by Aquaculture Research Sub Institute for North Central Vietnam (ARSINC) and South Australian Research and Development Institute (SARDI) This report is one of the outputs which validate the project by presenting the socio-economic, technical evaluation, clam culture influence, and technical adoption rate of clam households In addition, the results of this report were also compared with the “Baseline

Survey” report wherever it was possible

1.2 Objective of this study

II STUDY METHODOLOGY

2.1 Study location

This investigation was conducted in six provinces situated in North Central Vietnam, includes: Thanh Hoa, Nghe An, Ha Tinh, Quang Binh, Quang Tri and Thua Thien - Hue (Fig 1)

on family income sources, and factors influencing and being influenced by clam culture

The second questionnaire was used to survey data on technical adoption rate This questionnaire was used for both types of tidal and pond clam culture farms This

Travel rout during 20- 25 August

2005 for the project developmentand stakeholder/ beneficiary analysis

Thanh Hoa Nghe An

Ha Tinh Quang Binh Quang Tri Thua Thien-Hue

PROJECT PROVINCES

questionnaire had two main parts Part one was used to collect information on clam culture pond households with seven subsections indicating pond selection criteria; pond cleaning; seed selection and stocking; algal production and pond management; harvesting and preservation; preparing production plan, data recording and financial analysis; and household suggestions Part two was used for the collection of information on clam culture by tidal households involving seven subsections which include: site selection; site preparation; seed stocking; monitoring and management; harvesting and preservation; production plan making, data recording and financial analysis; and household suggestions

Secondary in formations were collected from published and unpublished reports and data gathered from fisheries departments

2.3 Data analysis

Collected data and information were validated and assessed Data was also classified and analyzed based on types of clam culture (tidal and pond clam culture) in all provinces at the project location EXCEL software was used to analysis data Descriptive statistics on the variables of mean, min., max., percentage were calculated to describe the clam farming systems and assesses technical adoption rate of trained clam households

III RESULT AND DISCUSION

This section is divided into five sub-sections; general household information (Section 3.1), clam culture activities (Section 3.2), factors influencing and being influenced by clam culture (Section 3.3), technical adoption rate of trained households of pond clam culture (Section 3.4), and technical adoption rate of trained households of inter-tidal clam culture (Section 3.5) Data of this survey is compared with the data given in the Baseline report at the beginning of the project stage; however, the comparison is only made wherever it was possible

3.1 Household information

3.1.1 Information of respondent

The information about age, gender and education of clam culture farmers in the project site are presented in the Table 1 The tidal and pond clam culture respondents were from a wide age group The average age of respondents in whole region was 47.9 years and ranged between 28 to 56 years There was not much difference in average age noticed from the Baseline survey (45.2 years) The difference in respondents age of tidal (48.2 years) and pond (47.7 years) clam culture groups are not significant The pond clam culture is relatively a new activity which was taken-up after this CARD project implementation

Male respondent occupied a major proportion of both tidal and pond clam culture groups accounting for 95.9 and 94.2 %, respectively Only 4.7% of respondents are female and this percentage ranged between 4.1% (tidal culture group) and 5.8% (pond culture group)

In the study area, the entire clam culture respondents (farmers) were literate In general, there

were 57.9% of respondents that had completed a secondary school level of education The

figures of tidal and pond clam culture group were 59.8 and 55.1%, respectively Respondents

with a high school level of education were the second largest proportion with an average of

34.2% in all provinces and farming systems ranged between 33.1% and 38.1% of tidal and

pond clam culture groups respectively With regard to other respondent education levels such

as primary school and vocational levels were low in percentage

Table 1: Age, gender and education information of survey respondent in the project site

The data about household size and household member’s gender are presented in the Table 2

The household size averaged 5.6 persons per farm There was no significant difference in

household size between tidal culture and pond culture groups (5.4 compared to 4.9 persons

per household, respectively) Numbers of male and female averaged 2.7 and 2.9 persons per

farm for the project area respectively

Table 2: Household size and gender of household member in the study provinces

3.1.2.2 Household labor

The information on the household labor force and labor required in clam aquaculture is presented in the Table 3 There was no significant difference in the total labor force of households, or gender for the labor member ratio between tidal and pond clam culture On average for all six study provinces, the number of laborers per household was 3.4, of which male and female laborers were 2.2 and 1.2 persons, respectively

For clam aquaculture labor, the numbers of family members involved in tidal clam aquaculture was higher than that in pond culture (2.8 compared to 1.8 labors per farm) Calculated labor of both tidal and pond clam culture was 2.3 persons per household, ranging between 1 and 4 laborers per household This is less than the Baseline survey (2.7 labors per farm) However, at the time of the Baseline survey, only tidal clam culture was being practiced in the project area This report is prepared based on the information collected on both pond and tidal clam culture The numbers of laborers involved in tidal culture system were similar between this study and the Baseline survey (2.8 and 2.7 laborers per household, respectively)

Table 3: Labor force of clam culture farm and laborers involved in clam aquaculture

The respondents indicated six activities as supplementary occupations for households in the

study area These activities include: aquaculture, agriculture, fisheries capture, fish

processing, trade, and labor services Aquaculture as a sup-occupation percentage was low in

both tidal and pond culture groups and occupied only 4.8%, in general Other activities of

sup-occupation ranged between 13.1% and 21.7% respectively Many families had no

supplementary occupation

Table 4: Information on household occupations in the study area

3.1.2.4 Household clam aquaculture experiences

Clam aquaculture experiences for households in the project area were presented in the Table

5 In general, the average experience of clam culture households was 4.7 years and widely

ranged from 1 to 10 years Farmers who practiced tidal clam aquaculture had more

experience than that of pond clam culture (6.5 compare to 1.7 years) Please note that before

the implementation of this CARD project there was no commercial pond clam culture

existing in Vietnam The ranking of culture experience for the two groups was also different,

tidal culture ranged between 2 and 10 years, but pond culture ranged between 1 and 2.5 years

In the Baseline report, the experience of tidal clam culture for households was 7.3 years, this

is a comparatively longer time than that of the estimated period in this study This may be due

to the fact that more farms practiced tidal clam culture in recent years and this project

contributed to the increase in clam culture Therefore, the average years of clam farming

experience was lower

Table 5: Clam aquaculture experience of households in the project area

3.1.2.4 Household clam culture training

The information about technical training, training quality and rate of technical application were showed in the Table 6 84.2% of households in the project area were trained in clam culture techniques More pond culture households were trained in technical aspects than tidal culture households (95.3% compared to 75.4%, respectively) Most of the farmers indicated that the quality of technical training courses was good (83.5%) More farmers in the pond clam culture group appreciated the quality of the training course compared to farmers of tidal clam culture group (86.3% compare to 76.2%) 13.5% of households rated the training received as satisfactory 12.5 % of the farmers undertaking pond clam culture and 20.2 % of tidal culture groups reported receiving satisfactory levels of training Some farmers thought that the quality of the training courses were bad (1.2%) or others did not answer (1.8%)

It was estimated that 96.4% of clam farmers that had undertaken training courses applied the new techniques In the pond clam culture group, this proportion was 100% However, a slightly lower percentage (95.2%) was reported in the tidal clam culture group Therefore, it can be concluded that the training provided under this project has had a significant impact on the application of advanced clam culture techniques

Table 6: Clam culture technical training, quality and rate of application in the study

Table 7 demonstrates that the agriculture land is only 0.27 ha per household, and ranged

between 0.05 and 0.53 ha per farm Pond culture farmers owned more land area than the tidal

culture group (0.33 compare to 0.14 ha per farm, respectively) Other land uses such as

garden and house land is about 0.2 ha per family, and ranged between 0.18 and 0.21 ha per

farm

Table 7: Type and area of land holding for farmers in the study region

3.2 Clam culture activities

3.2.1 Clam culture technical indicators

3.2.1.1 Pond/tidal area condition and clam culture system

The origin of land used in clam aquaculture and pond water sources statistics in the study

area are shown in the Table 8 Almost all the land (91.3%) used in aquaculture was converted

from unused land All of the tidal culture households used bare land or tidal flats to culture

clams There was 21.5% of the clam farming pond culture group converting agriculture land

into clam culture Whereas the proportion of farmers who used unused land for the culture of

clams in ponds was 78.5% It has appeared that almost all farmers in the study area used bare

land, tidal flats or less profitable agriculture land to do clam culture with the aim of increased

83.6% of the surveyed farmers indicated that water sources used for clam culture were

unpolluted In the overall study area, 16.4% of households answered that water sources were

polluted Water pollution described here was only from agriculture and other farming activities This survey does not cover chemical pollution from industry

3.2.1.2 Pond/tidal clam culture area

Table 9 presents the clam aquaculture area and water depth in the study provinces On average for both tidal and pond culture household groups, the clam aquaculture area is 1.05

ha per household There clam culture area, ranged between 0.04 and 7.50 ha per house hold The area of the clam tidal farming farm is much higher than that of pond culture group (1.45ha compare to 0.56 ha,)

The depth of clam culture in the tidal flats is totally depended on tidal regime, the topographical and slope of the flats In the survey region, the water depth reached up to 2.5

m, with an average of 1.56 m While the depth of the average clam pond culture systems was 0.52 m, and ranged from 0 to 1 m

Table 9: Clam aquaculture area for clam farmers and tidal effect depth in the region

capacity of 18-20 million spat These four hatcheries are:

(i) Hoang Thanh Fisheries Seed Production Centre (Thanh Hoa province);

(ii) Hai Tuan Fisheries Seed Production Hatchery (Ninh Binh province);

(iii) Van Xuan Fisheries Seed Production Hatchery (HCM City); and

(iv) Aquaculture Research Sub Institute for North Central Vietnam (ARSINC)

Therefore seed produced from recently established clam hatcheries has only been available for the last 16 months These hatcheries are not yet functioning at the full capacity It will take at least another 1-2 years for the hatcheries to be functioning at full capacity Hopefully,

in accordance with plans these hatcheries would function at 100% of there potential and will also expand in the next few years to produce more spat to meet the increasing clam seed demand

Figure 2: Clam seed marketing channel

Currently, the majority of clam seed is collected from the wild The survey showed that the clam spat is marketed through two channels which includes, wild seed directly collected by farmers themselves and is also purchased from middlemen 97% of seed source for the pond culture group was supplied from middlemen, while this figure of tidal culture farmers was 84.3%

Table 10: Clam seed sources of household in the study provinces

Wild

From

There is a parallel trade of advanced seed production using wild spat existing in some provinces within the project command area This type of clam seed production is relatively slow and takes a few months to produce juvenile clam seed to stock in the grow-out farms This spat nursery activity is mainly carried out in tidal areas The spat collected from the wild

is mainly from Ben Tre, Tien Giang provinces, in Southern Vietnam and a small percentage from Thai Binh, Nam Dinh provinces in Northern Vietnam and is transported to the tidal nursing centre Currently with the technical assistance from this project, the spat are being

Seed collected from wild (99%)

Seed sourced from hatchery (1%)

Wholesaler (91%) Seed collector (labor)

(8%)

Retailer

Clam farmer

This channel is being developed) 16%

75%

1%

nursed in ponds within a shorter time period and have become more available for the farm

This is one of the key achievements of this project

3.2.1.4 Seed stocking size and density

Table 11 presents the seed stocking size and stocking density in different clam culture

systems within the study area There is a significant difference of seed stocking size between

tidal and pond culture systems Seed stocking size in the pond culture groups was much

bigger than that of tidal culture farmers group (compared to 285.3 seeds per kg ponds to

785.7 seeds per kg in tidal area) The average stocking size of clams ranged between 240 and

1,000 seeds per kg and averaged 561.5 seeds per kg It was noted that present seed stocking

sizes in the tidal culture was smaller compared to the Baseline data (before the project

implementation)

Table 11: Seed stocking size and stocking density

The average stocking density for both the tidal and pond culture systems was 95.6 seeds per

m2 and varied significantly ranging from 25 to 150 seeds per m2 Pond clam culture farmers

stocked a lower number of seed compared to tidal farmers (68.8 compare to 102.6 seed per

m2, respectively) The seed size and culture conditions were also taken into account while

deciding the stocking density Tidal farmers stocked relatively smaller seed in high density

and natural feed for clams is generally more abundant in the tidal area compared to the pond

condition Data in the baseline report showed that the clam stocking density was about

4,050.9 seed per m2, this is significantly higher than the density reported based on this

survey However, the baseline survey calculated for both grow out and spat nursing systems,

whist this study concentrated more on grow out farming

3.2.1.5 Clam harvesting size and productivity

Clam harvesting size and productivity are presented in the Table 12 The average clam

harvesting size of both pond and tidal culture types in the project area is about 52 clams per

kg and ranged from 35 to 60 clams per kg This is not much different in terms of clam

harvesting size between this study and the Baseline survey (52 compare to 50 clams per kg,

respectively) A can be seen in Table 12, clam harvestable size of pond farmers was bigger

than that of tidal farmers (48.7 and 53.1 clams per kg, respectively)

The average clam productivity of both pond and tidal culture in the region is nearly 11.3

tones per ha, and varied between 4.2 and 41.4 tones per ha There was a significant difference

in clam productivity between tidal (13 tones per ha) and pond culture (8.1 tones per ha,

respectively) In the Baseline survey report, the productivity of clam culture was found to be

about 12.7 tones per ha Therefore, clam productivity of the Baseline survey is slightly lower

than the productivity of the tidal culture farms in this study Clam productivity in the tidal

areas increased after the implementation of the CARD project

Table 12: Harvesting size and productivity of clam cultures

3.2.1.6 Clam selling type and clam for family consumption

It can be seen in Table 13, that most of the clam production (79.1%) in the study area was

sold via a wholesale market for processing and consumption This figure is not much

different from the data given in the Baseline report (82.6%) There was no notable difference

in terms of the wholesale selling method between tidal and pond culture households (82.3%

compare to 74.6%, respectively) The proportion of clams sold by retailers for both tidal and

pond culture was low, and accounted for 6.7% and 10.1%, respectively Farmers who

indicated that they sold clams by both methods wholesale and retail is about 12% and ranged

from 11% to 15.3% of tidal and pond culture farmers, respectively On average, the clams

used for family consumption was 113.3 kg per household per year and ranged between 40

and 180 kg Tidal clam households used more clams for consumption than pond families

(121.8 compare to 97.4 kg per farm) The clam marketing channels in the study area is

presented in Figure 3

Table 13: Clam selling type and clams for family consumption

Figure 3: Clam marketing channel in the study area

3.2.2 Clam culture economic indicator

3.2.2.1 Pond/tidal area preparation cost

Table 14 presents the area preparation cost, fencing or watch tower costs, casting or stocking costs, watch or guard costs and land tax costs of clam households in the study region In general cost of clam area preparation before stocking was about 2.5 million VND per ha, ranging widely from around 0.6 to 3.5 million VND per ha This cost represented 3.3% of the total costs Cost of land area repair of tidal culture and pond culture groups was 2.9% and 5.1% or 2.3 and 2.9 million VND per ha, respectively

Average costs of fencing and watch towers was one million VND per ha equivalent to 1.3%

of the total cost, and ranged between 1% in the pond culture group and 1.6% in tidal culture farmers In regards to casting and stocking, the average cost was appropriately 5.8 million VND per ha or equivalent to 7.6% of the total cost, this ranged widely from 1.5 to 8.5 million VND per ha There was no significant difference in term of percentage of casting and stocking costs of tidal culture and pond culture clam households (7.8% and 7.4% of total cost respectively)

Watch and guard of the clam area are important activities The cost of this activity was about 5.8 million VND, on average (or equivalent 7.7% of total cost) and ranged from 0.8 to 11.5 million VND per ha There was a remarkable difference of watch and guard costs of tidal and

Wholesaler (80%)

Clam Farmer (Tidal and pond)

Vendor (5%) Retailer (10%)

Consumer

5%

pond clam culture groups The costs of tidal and pond culture farmers were around 8.6 and

2.3 million VND per ha or equivalent 10.5% and 4.1% of total cost respectively

As can be seen in Table 14, average land taxes and fees for land rent were 2.9 million VND

per ha, and ranged from 1.2 to 7 million VND per ha and accounted for 3.7% of the total

cost Land taxes or fees of tidal and pond culture farms were not much different in term of

percentage (3.9% and 3.3%, respectively), but in the case of monetary value, they were

significantly different (3.2 compare to 1.8 million VND per ha respectively)

Table 14: Cost for area repair, fencing and watch tower, casting/stocking, watch/guard

from pouching, and land tax/fee

Mean 2,365.9

(2.9)

2,893.8 (5.1)

2,506.4 (3.3)

1,003.5 (1.3)

5,782.9 (7.6)

5,813.2 (7.7)

2,958.4 (3.7)

Land tax/fee

(.000’ VND/ha)

Notice: numbers within bracket ( ) show % based on total cost

3.2.2.2 Seed, fertilizer and lime cost

Table 15 shows the costs of seed, fertilizers and lime associated with the culture of clams in

the project provinces It is clear that a major expenditure in clam culture is the seed

purchasing The mean value of clam seed cost of both tidal and pond culture farmers in the

study region was nearly 45.5 million VND per ha, and varied from 15.1 to 74.2 million VND

per ha, this accounted for 63.1% of the total cost Famers in the tidal culture group invested

more money in the purchase of seed/ha compared to pond culture farmers (51.5 compare to

37.5 million VND per ha respectively) Contrary, in case of the proportion, seed cost

percentage of clam pond culture group was higher than that of tidal households (66.6% and

62.3%, respectively)

As can be seen in Table 15, clam tidal farmers did not use fertilizers, lime or dolomite;

therefore the costs of these materials were zero However, clam pond culture households

spent about 2.2 million VND per ha for fertilizers (or 3.8% of total cost, equivalent) and 2.1

million VND per ha for lime/dolomite (or 3.5% of total cost, equivalent) This can be

explained as clam pond culture needs these materials to maintain the algal production for

clam feed in the ponds

Table 15: Seed, fertilizer and lime costs of clam culture in the project provinces

Mean 51,489.1

(62.3)

37,545.6 (66.6)

45,558.7 (63.1)

1,461.7 (1.9)

1,402.4 (1.8)

Notice: numbers in bracket ( ) show % compare to total cost

3.2.2.3 Hire labor and harvesting costs

Labor hire and clam harvesting costs are presented in the Table 16 In general, clam farmers

in the project area spent around 3.1 million VND per ha to hire labor for doing clam culture

(constituted 4.1% of total cost) The range of minimum and maximum values of hiring labor

varied from 0.6 to 6.4 million VND per ha Labor hiring costs of the tidal group was nearly

double compared to the pond clam culture group (4.3 compare to 2.2 million VND per ha,

respectively)

Cost of clam harvesting was the second largest total cost and accounted for 7.8% of the total

cost, with a monitory value of 5.6 million VND per ha this ranged from 1.6 to 11.5 million

VND per ha Harvesting cost for tidal farmers was significantly higher than that of pond

culture households (7.1 and 3.4 million VND per ha, respectively)

Table 16: Labor hire and harvesting costs

Mean 4,365.2

(5.3)

2,214.6 (3.9)

3,112.0 (4.1)

5,629.7 (7.8)

Notice: numbers in bracket ( ) show % compare to total cost

Area repair cost 2.9%

Havesting cost

8.6%

Fencing, watch tower cost 1.6% Casting/stocking

cost 7.8%

Watch and guard from pouching 10.5%

Land tax/fee 3.9%

Seed cost

62.3%

Hire labor cost

5.3%

Figure 4: Diagram indicating rate of input contribution of tidal clam culture

Area repair cost 5.1%

Fencing, w atch tow er cost 1.0% Casting/stocking

cost 7.4%

Watch and guard from pouching 4.1%

Land tax/fee 3.3%

Havesting cost 6.1%

Hire labor cost

Figure 5: Diagram indicating rate of input contribution of pond clam culture

3.2.2.4 Total cost, total income, benefit-cost ratio

Table 17 indicates the total costs, total income, benefit and benefit-cost ratio (BCR) for clam culture in the six study provinces Regarding the average total cost for clam culture required

an investment of about 75.2 million VND per ha and ranged from 28.2 to 109.5 million VND per ha As can be seen in Table 17, total cost of tidal clam culture was noticeably higher than that of clam culture in the pond system (82.6 compare to 56.3 million VND per ha) In this study, family labor was not included as it was very difficult to precisely estimate the cost due

to poor labor recording by clam farmers The total production cost of clams in this study is higher than that of the Baseline survey (66.9 million VND per ha) This may be due to a number of factors including more investment of clam households and/or the increase price of input materials, in particular clam seed which accounted for the highest proportion of the production cost

In general, the total average income of clam culture households of both tidal and pond culture farming was about 129.6 million VND per ha, with a minimum of 32.2 million VND per ha and a maximum of 189 million VND per ha The difference in income levels in tidal and pond culture groups was significant The tidal culture farmers had an income about 1.5 times higher than that of pond culture farmers The average tidal and pond culture income is 148.4 and 90.7 million VND/ha respectively Calculated data in the Baseline study showed that the total income of clam households was 121.6 million VND per ha for tidal farming Therefore,

at the time of the Baseline survey, the total income of tidal clam farmers was lower than that

of present farmers in this study This increase in income could be attributed to the increased knowledge in the farming practice The current CARD project played an important and essential role in increasing tidal clam productivity and introduced new calm culture techniques in ponds The pond culture practice at the initial stage started after the implementation of this project The income levels from pond cultures will further increase as farmers gain more experience in this practice In general, the income of clam farmers in this study was higher than that of the Baseline survey The income levels for tidal clam farmers increased from 121.6 to 148.4 million VND per ha

Based on the data from both tidal and pond culture farmers indicated that the average benefit value was 51.0 million VND and ranged widely from 16.5 to 97.1 million VND per ha Benefit for the clam tidal culture group was nearly two times higher than that of pond culture groups (65.8 compare to 34.4 million VND per ha respectively) Comparison with the Baseline survey result, the benefit of clam culture for tidal farmers in this research was higher than the benefit reported in the Baseline report This project greatly assisted in improving the income levels of the clam farmers

Benefit cost ratio (BCR) is a very important indicator to assess the economic effect of clam aquaculture BCR is measured by the ratio between total income and total cost Table 17 shows the BCR of different clam household groups (tidal culture and pond culture and both)

In general, average value of BCR of both farming types in all provinces was 1.72, this means

that if clam farms invest 1 VND it has an income 1.72 VND or benefit 0.72 VND

Comparison among groups, the BCR of tidal farmers was higher than that of pond farmers

(1.79 and 1.61, respectively) There was a significant difference in minimum and maximum

BCR values, ranging from 1.3 to 2.15

Table 17: Cost, income, benefit and benefit-cost ratio of clam farms

3.2.2.5 Capital sources and interest rate

The capital sources, quantity of borrowed capital and interest rate are given in Table 18

About 68.5% of interviewed farmers indicated that the capital was borrowed from both

on-farm and off-on-farm sources The proportion of on-farmers answered that the capital borrowed

from on-farm or off-farm sources was similar (15.9% and 15.6% respectively of total

interviewed farmers) Sources of capital associated with tidal and pond culture groups were

also similar for all types (on-farm, off-farm and both)

Table 18: Capital sources, amount of borrowed capital and interest rate

As can be seen in Table 18, the amount of borrowed capital for clam farmers in the project

area was nearly 19 million VND per household, and on average, ranged from 3 to 60 million

VND Tidal clam culture farmers borrowed larger capital amounts compared to pond clam

culture farmers (21.6 compare to 15.2 million VND per farm respectively) The average

interest rate was 0.8 percent per month This interest rate ranged between 0.5 and 1.2% per

month There was no significant difference in the interest rate between tidal and pond culture

farmers groups

3.2.2.6 Household income sources

Table 19 shows the results of different income sources for households in the study areas The

general average of total household income was around 180.5 million VND per household

The highest income for households was in tidal clam group (about 248.5 million VND per

household) Pond clam culture households had a total income of approximately 91.6 million

VND per farm

Table 19: Household income sources of farmers in the study area