Economic assessment of commercial-scale Edwardsiella ictaluri vaccine trials in U.S. catfish industry

Abstract

Enteric Septicemia of Catfish (ESC) is a ruinous bacterial disease affecting the U.S. catfish industry. Previous attempts to develop ESC vaccines have failed to achieve industry acceptance, largely attributed to difficulties in delivering the vaccine to immunocompetent fish. Recently, a live attenuated ESC vaccine has been developed, coupled with a mechanized platform designed to accurately deliver measured doses of vaccine with feed. This delivery scheme for vaccine-feed admixture has shown tremendous promise under controlled research settings. This study evaluated the economic effects of on-going commercial-vaccination trials on catfish fingerling operations in Mississippi. Commercial-vaccination trials for both channel and hybrid catfish demonstrated significant improvement in survival, growth, feed consumption, feed conversion and gross yield. At a realistic vaccination cost of $750/ha, the net economic benefits to channel and hybrid catfish fingerling-production phases were $3199 and $6145/ha, respectively. Whole-farm models showed additional profit ranging from $71,758 to $133,887/400-ha on farms that integrate fingerling production to their production strategies due to appropriation of more of the otherwise incumbent fingerling production acreage into foodfish production. Commercial adoption of the oral-vaccination platform would greatly enhance profitability while laying the foundation for development and delivery of polyvalent vaccines against other catfish diseases.