Status and Entrepreneurship Barriers of Freshwater Prawn Culture in Bangladesh

Abstract

The giant freshwater prawn (Macrobrachium rosenbergii, de Man), locally known as 'Golda,' plays an important role in the economy of Bangladesh by earning valuable foreign exchange, generating employment and raising protein food production. The focus of this study is to assess major barriers of freshwater prawn culture entrepreneurship in Chittagong region. Combination of the participatory methods including transect walks, focus group discussions and trend analysis were conducted with prawn farmers and associated groups to assess prawn culture opportunities and its challenges for sustainable development. The result showed that around 55,000 ha area of ponds are suitable for prawn farming with fish in this region. Although the great potentiality of prawn farming, lack of technical knowledge on pond management, prevalence of prawn disease, unavailability of credit along with 14 barriers have been identified as the potential obstruction of fresh water prawn farming entrepreneurships. Findings also shows that education, income from prawn culture, availability of information sources and knowledge on pond fish culture have negative significant relationships and age and family size have positive significant relationships with the barriers of prawn culture entrepreneurships.