The production value in the fisheries and aquaculture sector in Mexico last year was MXN 31 billion (USD 1.67 billion), representing an 18 per cent increase compared with 2012, Secretary of Agriculture, Livestock and Rural Development, Fisheries and Food (SAGARPA) Jose Calzada Rovirosa reported.

These growth rates, he stated, enabled the fulfillment of the six-year goal of reaching 12 kilos per capita consumption -- the one in 2012 was 8.9 kilos -- of seafood and aquaculture products, a sector that contributes 40 per cent the production value nationwide.

As part of PESCAMAR’s opening ceremony, Expo Restaurants & Expo Organic 2016, SAGARPA head noted that the Government of the Republic has clear ideas about the importance of supporting agricultural, livestock and fishery producers in the social sector, with technology, innovation and modernization of the primary sector.

He ensured that industrial fishing activity is well defined and its economic contribution as well as social fishing, is a sector of more than 300 thousand producers and an advance in aquaculture represented with 120,000 hectares and plans to increase its potential in states of the south-southeast areas of the country.

On the subject of the tuna embargo, the federal official said that the protocol work enabling the opening of this national product to the US market will continue.

\"Fighting is in force and we will not surrender, we will defend our position that Mexico has demonstrated care and sustainability of natural resources,\" he stressed.

In the event, held at the World Trade Centre in Mexico City, Jose Calzada Rovirosa highlighted that the decision to open the fishing activity in 10,000 square kilometers of the Campeche Sound, which for years was restricted to oil exploitation, will favour greater production growth, job creation and prosperity for small and medium scale fishermen of the states of Campeche, Tabasco and Tamaulipas.

Meanwhile, the National Commissioner of Aquaculture and Fisheries (CONAPESCA), Mario Aguilar Sanchez, pointed out that the fisheries and aquaculture activity has a lot to contribute to food security and poverty reduction, according to FAO´s estimates.

Source: FIS / Original Article