Market heats when fish cool down

With simple cooling storages made of wickerwork and blocks of ice, fishermen in Mihuru Bay on the Lake Victoria shore have bought themselves time to negotiate a better price on their catch.

“The containers are made by a member of our group,” explains Zeddy Oyag while lifting the lid of one of the big wickerwork baskets resting on stones and wood.

The socalled ‘traditional storage’ is about half filled; a block of ice and tens of kilos of freshwater fish tilapias make the contents.

“Due to our financial situation this is the only kind of cooling facility we can afford,” says Zeddy Oyag, who is the secretary of Mihuru Bay Fishermen Cooperative Society named after the small village South West of Kisumu on the coast of Lake Victoria.

Though the wickerwork basket storages may seem simple at a first glance, they have significantly improved the welfare of the community. Local distributers now have time to look for the right buyer of the fish. This is usually done via mobile phone directly to buyers.

Zeddy Oyag handling the fish stored in the homemade cooling facilities made by a member of the cooperative society.

Zeddy Oyag is the man in charge of storing and transporting the catch landed by fishermen on nearby beaches. He is also the owner of one of the traditional storages standing in a line with similar basket under a shady tree in the center of the village. The other storages are owned fully or on a shared basis between other members of the cooperative society.

The fish presently put on ice have all been caught during the last two to three days. When all storages are filled, Zeddy Oyag will arrange for a lorry to take the fish to markets in Nairobi where costumers are waiting for freshly caught nile perch or tilapia from Lake Victoria.

Each of the cooperative members then buy loading capacity. Usually the price is paid per woven basket that can carry between 200 and 500 kilos. These days local landings can fill two lorries a week, enough to ensure that the fish is still fresh when it reach costumers in city fish markets.

The fish put on ice have all been caught during the last two to three days. When all storages are filled, a lorry will take it to markets in Nairobi.

Before the era of the cooling storages community members had to sell their catch every afternoon before the fish started to rot from being exposed to heat and sun. This gave way to cynical middle men who were often seen hanging around the village waiting for fishermen to get desperate as the “best before” date of their catch was running out.  

In those days fishermen would surrender by late afternoon and sell for as little as 20 ksh per kilogram where as today nile perch rarely go under 60 ksh per kilo, states Moses Mabnika Mwikoma who is the manager of the cooperative society. 

Another measurable improvement that Moses Mwikoma has witnessed, can bee seen during April and May when catches are best in the local part of the lake and each boat of four fisherman can bring in as much as 400 kilograms a day.

During that season of the year local markets are flooded with freshly caught tilapia and nile perch and prices go down. Before the cooling storages were established, fishermen often landed their boat only to find their load to be worthless.

But with the introduction of cooling baskets fishermen have gained bargaining power. They can now send their catch to markets further away where prices are not so sensitive to local seasonal variations

“Earlier fishermen were forced to throw fish away during the high season because we could not sell it. Since we have gotten acces to new costumers that never happens,” Moses Mabnika Mwikoma states.

The welfare of the fisherman community has increased significantly since the introduction of the coolers.

The improved access to markets has raised welfare among members of the Mihuru Bay community. A derivative effect is that people have started sending their children to school, though many still drop out to take up fishing

Last year a so called beach bank was established in 2004 by MS partner OSIENALA (Friends of Lake Victoria).

The non-commercial beach bank offers micro finance and development services to fisher folk communities around the lake on the Kenyan side.

Initially people from the community had a low awareness about savings. So the staff of the local beach bank decided to seek out people and encourage them to put part of their income in the bank. They had to be taught about the benefits of saving and of drawing credits from the bank for investing.

The beach bank usually offers credits to fishermen who need to buy equipment e.g. nets or even mobil phones and airtime that enables them to get in touch with other communities.

Today the local branch has 400 members who together have saved more than a million ksh.

Though the community have now freed themselves from exploitation by outsiders when it comes to selling the fish, they still depend on buying ice from outside. The village is without electricity so the distributers depend on supplies of ice being brought to the site. Sometimes they manage to buy from a nearby Coca Cola storage, sometimes the truck drivers that drive up to bring the fish back for sale in markets in Nairobi bring ice and make a profit from selling it to community members.

“Getting ice is the problem. If we manage to get enough, we can store the fish for as long as a week before we send it to Nairobi. But the cooling system takes a lot of ice. A block will only last for about six hours,”says Zeddy Oyag.

In Port Victoria the fish market is on the beach, and lorries are waiting in a row to bring the catch to Nairobi.

Maybe a solution to the ice supply problem is just around the corner. MS-partner OSIENALA has assisted a nearby community in Mbita Point in applying for and getting money from the EU to establish an ice plant. The plan is that nearby communities such as Mihuru Bay shall receive regular supplies from that ice plant, explains Elias Awuondu of OSIENALA. He adds that OSIENALA has sofar supported the ice plant project with three million ksh. 

The fish is brought to the market directly from the boats in woven basket each carrying up to 500 kilograms

In Port Victoria, another beach village, situated north of Kisumu, people have already experienced the effects of having a ice machine. Here lorries are waiting in a row to bring fish to Nairobi, boats are bigger and have motors. They land on the beach day and night. to sell their catch on the local market where prices are better than on any other shore in the region. Many come from Uganda.

The ice plant is situated in a two store brick house on the beach. From three underground tanks water is pumped through purifying equipment to tanks on the roof. Then it is being processed into ice and slide down through the roof in plastic pipes and form big piles on the floor. When turned to maximum the plant can produce nine tons every 24 hours. That is enough to supply both the fish market, the trucks coming from Nairobi, and the boats that want to bring ice when the head for fishing grounds.

The iceplant in Port Victoria can produce a miximum of nine tons a day.

However the plant is not yet fully operative due to the lack of a backup generator. Hence the cooling storage that can take as much as 30 tons of fish cannot be used, explains the technician of the plant, Richard Juma Oganda.

“If we experience a power cut for just a few hours, the fish will be destroyed, so we are now hoping to get a generator he explains.”  

The technician adds that funding for a generator is underway.

There are still a lot of improvements waiting to be carried out on the lake Victoria shore.