Despite the massive importation of frozen fish into Nigeria, domestic demand is widening as the cost of feed has forced many farmers out of production.
On Monday, the federal government admitted that in spite of the country’s massive importation of frozen fish, the deficit of 2.5 million metric tonnes could not be bridged as the current demand has escalated to more than 3.6 million yearly.
Importation of frozen fish of all types costs the country over N500 billion annually.
Between 2019 and 2020, figures from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) showed that the importation had increased from $789.74 million to $1.2 billion respectively, representing 38 per cent (about $480.2 million) increase.
Also, between January and June 2021, statistics from the NBS showed that the country imported the blue whittling specie worth N62.4bn; herrings (forage fish, mostly belonging to the family of Clupeidae) imports cost N35.53bn and mackerel hit N25.75bn.
In the first three months of 2022, the NBS said Nigeria imported N22.7bn worth of fish into the country.