November 7, 2013
Nigeria opens floating fish feed extrusion plant
The official commissioning ceremony for the opening of their floating fish feed extrusion plant in Lagos, Nigeria was held last week.
The floating fish feed production plant has the capacity to produce 12 tonnes of extruded floating fish feed, and the mill will be supplying local farmers who until now had to rely on importing extruded fish feed into the country.
Speaking about the new plant at the commissioning, chairman of Akin-Sateru Farms, Oba Adetunji Akinloye, said that the new feed plant would help to reduce one of the biggest burdens on fish farmers in the country (the high cost of imported feeds), and encourage more companies to invest in the sub-sector.
"It is on record that Nigeria still spends about NGN80 billion (US$504 million) per annum on fish import into the country. With the reduction in the available open captured fish, it has become imperative that fish farming be taken as serious business," Akinloye said.
The extrusion plant was installed in 2010, with feed equipment being supplied by UK firm Alvan Blanch and floating fish feedextrusion equipment coming from US company Insta-Pro International. "We entered into discussions with Insta-Pro and with series of communications, culminating into a visit of Karl Arnold, vice president of the company, as well as subsequent visits to USA and Mexico, we purchased a comprehensive plant for the production of the floating fish feed in 2010," Akinloye said.
He continued saying, "We have taken another stride forward by signing a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Insta-Pro Engineering USA to operate their latest research and development machine code-named Medium Shear Extruder Machine, with the capacity to handle about 1.3 tonnes per hour of fish feed or 1.5 tonnes per hour of pet food."