USAID Invests $3 Million in Iraq's Aquaculture

A $3 million agreement with USAID's Inma Agribusiness Program to purchase six million fingerlings at a fixed price gave the Euphrates Fish Farm (EFF) hatchery the down payment it needed to fully resume operation. The fingerlings have the potential to generate 12 million tons of fish worth approximately $90 million at Iraqi retail markets.

Central Iraq boasts 70 percent of the country's fish farms, but in 2007 only a fraction of these were operational -- and even those were producing significantly below capacity. Built in the late 1970s, EFF was once one of Iraq's most modern aquaculture farm and hatchery operations, but it fell into disrepair and disuse after decades of conflict and sanctions.

Income-generation opportunities will ripple across Babil province as the new fingerlings are distributed to local fish farms. USAID, the U.S. military, the State Department, and two fish farmer associations identified beneficiary farms from the provincial capital of Hillah in the south to North Babil. Making fingerlings available to farmers who cannot afford to buy them at current prices augments recent military successes in securing and stabilizing the area by offering non-violent alternatives for residents to earn income.

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