Chief Investigator:

Prof. WONG Ming Hung

Project Year:

2015-2018

Description:

The major objective of this project is to upgrade food wastes as feeds for culturing freshwater fish in a safer and healthier environment, at a lower cost and producing fish with fewer contaminants (such as DDT and mercury) than the commercial feed pellets available in South China, based on our previous successful projects: (1) Appropriate combinations of food wastes (meat and vegetables) are able to replace a major portion of fish meal for cultivating safe and quality low-trophic level fish, at a lower cost. (2) Additions of probiotics and enzymes can further enhance the feed conversion ratio of feeds, and the immunity of fish. (3) Additions of Chinese medicinal herbs can enhance the immunity of fish (e.g., against intestinal infection of grass carp). Major experiments will be conducted at The Hong Kong Institute of Education (chemical and physiological analyses), EcoPark (laboratory-scale feeding trials) and fish ponds located in the New Territories (field-scale feeding trials). The upgraded food waste feed pellets will also be produced in the EcoPark. It is hoped that this project will (1) turn food wastes into valuable resources by fermentation using microorganisms, (2) provide safe and quality freshwater fish, at a lower cost, (3) enhance fish immunity using Chinese herbal medicine, instead of using antibiotics and other drugs, and (4) partially ease the pressure of treating/disposing the ever increasing amount of food wastes generated in Hong Kong.