Marketing and transport of processed fish from Lake Kainji to southeast Nigeria

Marketing of processed fish transported from New Bussa (Kainji Lake) to Onitsha (Southeast) was conducted by quantitative assessment at New Bussa. The packaged fish products were counted and weighed before loading into lorries. A total of one hundred and sixty eight fish traders were interviewed. The commercially important freshwater fish species traded from Kainji Lake to Onitsha were Alestes spp, Bagrus spp, Citharus citharus, Synodontis membranaceous, Clarias spp, Labeo spp, Oreochromis niloticus, Sarotherodon galilaeus and, Tilapia zilli. The total weight of fish transported weekly from March - May 2007 ranged from 5,750Akg to 19,943.6kg and cost between N2, 688,000 to NlO, 178,000. The extrapolated annual transported fish products at the landing in New Bussa to South - East was 690.2 metric tonnes worth N329,888,004.00. These figures represent 7.5% of the published data on the total fish production in Lake Kainji. Marketing of processed fish from Kainji Lake is faced with constraints of bad road, spoilage of fish products due to improper smoking et