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Intermediaries in the aquarium fish trade

Rebecca Turley, Emily Malsack
Jun 26, 2017
3 min read

It has been an adventurous couple of weeks here in the Philippines: start of the rainy season, ear infections, giant spiders, rabies jabs, and plagues of ants.

On the bright side, during a recent trip to Manila, we visited two exporters of aquarium fish collected in Calatagan. Both Monet Trading and Aquahab have collectors across the Philippines—from Mindanao in the very south, to Cebu, and Luzon in the north—and mainly ship to customers in the US and Europe, including aquaria in Manchester and London. We met the owners of both companies and were given a tour around the warehouses.

Row after row of holding tanks for the aquarium fish, pictured here at Aquahab.

Credit: E.Malsack.

There were noticeable differences between the two on the way fish were processed. The larger of the two exporters quarantines and acclimatises their fish for 3-4 hours, before they are moved to the main holding facility. They do not stay there for long, as within 4 days the fish are packaged and shipped abroad, with rejected fish being sold to domestic “black markets” and other suppliers. An estimated 1000 individual fish

are exported per week from this one exporter, the most common being damselfish and angelfish. However, it is current the lean season for the aquarium trade, and in December demand for aquarium fish will peak.

Juvenile Emperor Angelfish, very different in appearance to the adult, and can easily be confused for a whole other species. Credit: E. Malsack.

The smaller-scale exporter trades a mixture of fish, invertebrates and even sharks, including a black tip reef sharks for a public aquarium in Los Angeles. All fish are screened immediately on arrival, which involves checking every that individual is the right size (not too small or too skinny) and has no damage to its body or fins. Fish that pass screening are then moved to a quarantine section, where they are held until ordered by customers. Rejected fish can be returned to the ocean with their collectors, although we know little about their long-term survival.

Both exporters employ a specialised packaging process: Each fish is placed in an individual bag, to avoid fighting, which is filled with 60% oxygen and 40% water to ensure their survival through travel. One of the owners told us that she was trained in the appropriate packaging techniques by the Marine Aquarium Council (MAC), and that, from her experience, she can tell when fish have been (illegally) caught using cyanide instead of nets, due to their strange behaviour and poor quality.

Staff at Monet trading working hard to finish packaging fish for their next shipment to Germany. Credit: E. Malsack.

We learned that the price that fish collectors receive has not changed for at least 11 years. At Aquahab, the exporter explained that fish collectors recently requested, and received, a 5 peso increase (equivalent to 8 UK pence). Both exporters try to support their collectors by offering cash advances and loans for equipment. Some exporters have also been given nets by the NGO, Haribon Foundation, such as the saplad net, to sell to their fish collectors.

Back in Calatagan, we have also observed an alternative supply of nets; local fish collectors, or their wives, will often fashion their own nets. We visited Nanay Susan, an elderly lady who has been weaving Saplad and scoop nets for over 40 years. Nanay Susan’s nets are of a very fine mesh that is more effective for collecting aquarium fish than larger mesh sizes. It can take 1 month for her to make a whole Saplad net measuring 1 meter in length.

Nanay Susa is intricately weaves a saplad net for an aquarium fisher in Santa Ana. Credit: M.Soniega.

We are currently undertaking interviews with fish collectors and traders. We’ve learned many details about how the trade is organised, including its specific gender roles. For example, a number of our female interviewees in Santa Ana, including the wives of the collectors, do not harvest fish but instead collect invertebrates from the intertidal zone, and act as byahero intermediaries who transport the fish to the exporters in Manila.