Bless the fish

A year before Mt. Pinatubo erupted, Jose and Agnes sold the three bungalow houses they rented out to American soldiers and bought a two-hectare farm in Arayat, Pampanga. Without much research–except from what they had heard from people around–the Tayags converted the farm into a fishpond for St. Peter’s fish or tilapia, using the P312,000 it borrowed from the Balikatan sa Kabuhayan program of the Technology and Livelihood Resources Center.

The couple’s son, Rene Tayag, operated the Tayag fishpond while he finished his commerce degree at the Angeles University Foundation. After two harvests, the Tayags expanded into hatchery and grow-out operation, using money from the Mt. Pinatubo Rehabilitation Program. "Our yield of 34 tons per cropping season was not enough to supply the growing demand for fish previously served by ponds buried in lahar," said Tayag.

To finance their planned 13-hectare hatchery expansion and a 200 square-meter open air dispersal center, the Tayags took out a bigger TLRC loan totaling P6 million. They also put up another 0.5 hectare intensive nursery, complete with heaters and modern aerators, for an additional 5,000 breeders to meet the 10 million per month demand of farmers for fingerlings.

In 1999, the Tayags incorporated their business as TGA Farms, Inc. with a capitalization of P50 million.

Today, the business supplies fingerlings to neighboring fishponds in Pampanga and other provinces in Central Luzon. It also supplies the fish fillet requirements of first-class hotels and restaurants in the country.

Grow-out sector

TGA Farms’ hatchery operations produces 62 million genetically improved farmed tilapia (GIFT) sex-reversed fingerlings for the grow-out sector, ranking second among eight GIFT hatcheries in Luzon. TGA gets its brood stock from the GIFT Foundation.

Using the artificial incubation technology, the fertilized eggs/yolk-sac fry are removed from the mouth of their mothers and incubated artificially. The fry are then placed in nursery ponds and tanks for 25 days. The last step is the grading of fingerlings for disposal.

In its first year of using AIT in 1998, sales of TGA Farms went up 203% and net income shot up by 408% to P11.119 million.

The AIT technology of the Tayags is a first in Central Luzon. It has enabled the company to supply the fingerlings requirements of 200 farmers in Pampanga, the biggest producer of tilapia in the country with approximate fishpond area of 480 hectares or about 60 million fingerlings at an estimated P192,000 per cropping per farmer.

Showcase

TGA Farms is regularly brought out by different government agencies such as TLRC as a success story. For example, it was cited as TLRC’s outstanding client in its Parangal Pang-kabuhayan 2000.

Aside from the TLRC loan, which it has fully repaid early this year, TGA Farms is borrowing P6 million under the Agricultural Competitiveness Enhancement Fund (ACEF) of the Department of Agriculture. Proceeds of the loan will go into a fish processing plant which will produce fillets and other finished products.

Raw materials rejects such as fish bones and skin will be used by the fish feed plant, which is expected to cost between P50 million and P80 million when it starts commercial operations this July. The fish feed mill will be operated by FeedWorld Inc., which is 49% owned by TGA.

"The fish feed sector has three to four major players, which can hardly fill up the market for fish feed of 120,000 MT a month," said Tayag. FeedWorld is targeting an initial production of 25,000 MT a year.

High demand

To meet the demand for fish fillet, TGA Farms is currently looking for business partners or subcontractors in Nueva Ecija and to Regions 4 and 5 willing to put up fishponds and engage in out-grow operations. "We can hardly fill the requirement/orders of hotels and restaurants that have tried out our fish fillets during our four tilapia festivals," Tayag said.

With higher production, TGA Farms will be able to export his fillets and other products such as crispy fish skin or chicharon to the United States as well as to other countries in Asia, the Middle East and Europe.

"To enter these markets, we would need a business partner, a reliable distributor," said Tayag.

TGA Farms has flourished because of such partnerships in both government and the private sector.