Crayfish cultivation growing apace as sales go up along with prices

Crayfish cultivation is steadily growing in scale in Jiading, as the dish has become increasingly popular, especially as summer approaches.

Sales have been going up along with the price.

This year the cultivation area in the district area has reached 570 mu (38 hectares) from 300 mu in 2018 and is still rising, involving more leisure events such as agricultural tourism and cray fishing competitions.

Some farmers make use of the paddies to breed crayfish at the same time. Like vegetables, some crayfish are even raised in the greenhouses.

“This greenhouse covers an area of about 1 mu and we raise over 5,000 crayfish here,” said Feng Xiaofei, manager with the Subei Renjia farm in Xuhang Town.

“The market price is 100 yuan (US$15) for 1 kilogram at the moment and we expect to make 20,000 yuan from this greenhouse,” he said.

Feng keeps 92 mu of breeding area this year and if this batch is mature enough to sell by the end of April, he will be able to raise a second batch.

Although faced with competition from Jiangsu and Hubei provinces, local crayfish in Jiading saves transport costs and gets the upper hand with the timing by using the greenhouses.

The intercropping technique has been a boost to the trade as well. Liu Kekun is one of the farmers who rotate the crayfish and rice in the paddy. Liu said: “80-90 percent of the crayfish can be sold out by the end of June and we will start to plant rice shoots then.”

The rice production amount will be half of that in the common field, but thanks to the crayfish, rice here raised without fertilizer can sell at 16 yuan per kilogram, which is three to four times more expensive than normal price.

The economic chain still extends. A park in Huating Town brings in a cray fishing event this year and the attraction now awaits more visitors.