Ečka's carp ready for European market

- At the end of the fishing season and record "harvest" of 3,600 tons of fattened carp and young fish, Fish Farm Ečka in Lukino Selo, near Zrenjanin, is getting ready to return to the demanding European market and offer 1,000 tons of fish to that market already at the end of this year - said Nenad Radulović, the CEO of that stock company.

- Domestic market has become small, primarily due to excessive import of fish, so that we see the way out in the comeback to the markets of Germany, France, Italy, Greece, and all the way to Israel, where we are competitive in both quality and the price of 2 EUR per kilogram of fattened carp - said Radulović.

In order for the export to start, only one more step, which is both necessary and quite big, must be taken, and that is the completion of "monitoring residue", which is financed by European Union. It is the testing of existence of harmful matters in fish meat, which is carried out by the Belgrade Institute of Meat Hygiene and Technology.

The Chief Technologist in Fish Farm Ečka, Zoran Mažić, explains that Ečka's carp has become famous after careful and long-time selection, special diet, thermally processed and easily digestable food, cleaning of the water that comes from the Tisa to the lake, and the series of other measures.

Thanks to these measures, the fish farm also obtained certificates from renonew companies, so that international standards such as HACCP system and the quality management system are already applied.

With the centuries-long tradition of fish growing (mainly carp and about 10% of sheat fish, catfish and some other species), famous Banat's fishermen are now throwing fish nets in the lakes at total of 1,700 ha, situated between Lukino Selo, Belo Blato and Ečka, about 15 km away from Zrenjanin, and fish is also grown in the vicinity of Melenci, Srpski Itebej and Čenta.

The Provincial Fund of Vojvodina set aside over 106m RSD at the beginning of this year, based on the open competition for year 2009, for development of fishing, 25m RSD of which were invested in modernization and expansion of production in Ečka, while the fishermen in the Province will get 150m RSD on the basis of the open competition for this year.